


Skip a Sinking Stone

by Jolli_Bean



Category: Detroit: Become Human (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Angst with a Happy Ending, Bottom Connor (Detroit: Become Human), Bottom Hank Anderson, But still pretty canon-compliant, Canon-adjacent, Canon-typical references to Hank's alcoholism, Cock Warming, Connor (Detroit: Become Human) Has a Penis, Dirty Talk, Falling In Love, Hand Jobs, Light Angst, M/M, Oral Sex, Phone Sex, Porn With Plot, Porn with Feelings, Public Hand Jobs, Sensory Deprivation, Sugar Baby Connor, Top Connor (Detroit: Become Human), Top Hank Anderson, Wire Play
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-22
Updated: 2020-02-02
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:46:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 70,273
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21906952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jolli_Bean/pseuds/Jolli_Bean
Summary: "So," Hank says. “How long have you been doing the whole...you know. Sugar baby thing."Connor laughs at that. He has a loud laugh when it's startled out of him. "I usually prefer 'escort'.""Oh," Hank says. He's opening his mouth to apologize, and maybe Connor can tell, because he waves him off before he can get a word out."That's okay," he says, a small smile on his face. "I can be your baby, if you want me to be."~~Hank and Connor meet in March 2039 after a successful android revolution, when Connor is paying the bills as a hirable companion.
Relationships: Hank Anderson/Connor
Comments: 105
Kudos: 483





	1. truths we are afraid to face

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The titles in this fic are from Mutual Benefit's "Sinking Stone", which is a big HankCon mood: 
> 
> _Like how we tried to skip a sinking stone  
>  Just to watch how long that it could go  
> I'm so afraid to fall in love again  
> I know how it ends_
> 
> _And if I try and skip a sinking stone  
>  Maybe it'll be the one that goes  
> Forever as it starts its flight  
> Towards the horizon line_
> 
> ~
> 
> I commissioned some art of the drive-in date in this chapter from [Evelyn](https://twitter.com/wow__then), which you can see [here!](https://twitter.com/wow__then/status/1206766772898033664)

_Detroit, MI_

_March, 2039_

Connor misses working.

Not police work, necessarily. If he had his choice, he doesn't know if he would have kept on in that field or not. 

He would have liked the opportunity to find something he liked doing, though, to explore himself a little since vocation is a fundamental part of identity for so many humans. Markus always says their lives don't have to take the same shape humans' do...but still. 

Connor thinks it would be nice, finding something he liked to do.

Or maybe he just misses being busy. Connor can never quite tell the difference. His people tend to struggle with being idle - it's not something programmed into them. They're not designed to like being still. 

It's true the world has gotten better for them in the last four months, and so Connor tries not to be ungrateful, but better is always a relative thing. Better than where they came from doesn't mean good.

The problem is mostly the jobs. _Mostly._ When the government recognized androids as people with autonomy, it meant they couldn't keep them in their positions providing free labor. And because the unemployment rate among humans was at an all time high, most companies that could afford to pay for those same positions chose to hire human workers instead of keeping the androids on in a paid capacity, leaving most androids without any income.

It makes sense, that they want to look out for their own first. Connor understands that. And for all the progress they've made, there's still a divide, because change is a decision that happens all at once, and then an implementation that comes slow. 

Most androids are like Connor, adrift without a traditional paycheck. The lucky ones had families who cared for them and who either pay them for their work now, or who just let them live in the same house as a member of the family - primarily domestic androids, which is an ironic turn of events, considering that Connor once thought, long before he even deviated, that he wouldn’t have liked to be a domestic android at all.

But things are good for some of them, it seems like. Connor envies them now.

For androids who were only ever owned by a business, like Connor, things are just better. Not good. Not yet.

And for all of them, they've had to find some way to pay the bills, because they need maintenance, and thirium, and because they may be able to live outside without getting cold but those days are supposed to be behind them, and they want roofs over their heads.

Those sources of income look different for each of them. For Connor, it mostly looks like keeping lonely men company. 

And it's not work he always necessarily enjoys - he's entertained plenty of men he doesn't like, and several others who just frankly aren't interesting to him - but it is work he's good at. He's designed for investigative work, so he's good at reading people, and he learned how to build that trait until he became a skilled conversationalist.

So many people need someone to talk to, Connor is learning. The divorce rate rose with unemployment, and people are lonely.

And they'll pay well for someone who can make them feel any other way.

It’s mostly repeat customers, some dinners, some weddings and work events and other occasions where people are too ashamed to be seen alone. It's looking bright-eyed and engaged and making men feel seen and interesting.

It pays the bills, at least, keeps Connor in his small studio apartment and enables him to buy his thirium replenishments on time, and a few indulgences for himself.

It's good enough for now, and better than what most androids have.

Connor gets the email from Hank Anderson while he's out with someone else, and he shouldn't read it until he's home when he has a client paying for his time, but the subject line catches his eye.

"Date for MACP Awards??"

MACP is Michigan Association of Chiefs of Police and...well. It's been a while since Connor was in that world, and maybe he misses it, or maybe he's just morbidly curious to see what he's missing out on. He opens the email before he can stop himself.

"Hey," it reads. "You're, like, a companion for hire, right?"

Connor catches himself smiling at that - that's one way to put it. He's cute.

“Fuck, I feel stupid doing this,” the email continues, “but I have a work gala on the 21st, and I need a date. Probably for four hours? Maybe five? Let me know if you're free and you want to."

Within two minutes, Connor accesses all his available public records and knows everything there is to know about Hank Anderson.

And he's interested. For a lot of reasons. 

"Hi, Hank," he writes back. "Would you like to get coffee next week to talk about how I can meet your needs? My treat - just this once ;)"

(Most of this work is just casual flirting, and Connor is good at that, when he wants to be.) 

In the morning, he has another email from Hank that says, "You're fast. I'm off on Thursday if that works for you - maybe around 10?"

Connor sends Hank the address for the coffee shop around the block from his apartment, and writes, "It's a date. :)"

* * *

Hank sits outside the coffeeshop on Thursday morning, and he has no idea what he's doing.

That's true more often than not the last few years. At best, he doesn't know what he's doing, and at worst, he's just moving through a haze. 

He can't say why he ended up on Connor's profile in the first place. Because he's sick of going places with hundreds of people in the room and not having anyone to talk to, maybe. He used to have decent relationships with everyone at work, but he's burned plenty of bridges since 2035. Ben and Jeff are still his friends, but in that odd sort of way where they don't really talk, and where they've spent months being sick of him phoning it in at work and having to pick up the slack.

So there's the sheer loneliness of it, definitely. 

And there's the part of him that genuinely misses having anyone to talk to, because fuck, it's probably been since shortly after Cole died and Jen left that he really had that. Jeff and Ben tried to be there for him in their own ways, but Hank just pushed them away. 

It's difficult to believe now that he ever wanted to be this alone, but he did at that point.

And then there's the fact that so many androids are in shit situations since the revolution, and he has money in the bank, and this seems like a fine enough place to put it. 

It's helping someone, he tells himself. Maybe that's just fooling himself, or trying to find another reason that isn't so fucking sad, but it's true that he has money he doesn't need. He's hardly bought anything outside of the essentials in almost four years. 

He wants to hope he can do some good for someone with it.

Still, there were other androids on that site, and he doesn't let himself think too hard about why he picked Connor's profile and looked at it for so long (because Connor was an investigative prototype and maybe they have some shit in common, and because he remembers Connor covered in blue blood on the broadcast the night of the revolution, and because if CyberLife compiled every single one of Hank's late-night porn searches into one pretty face, it would look a hell of a lot like Connor). 

Setting aside the physical interest that he's certainly never going to act on, though, Hank had himself convinced that this was a good idea a few days ago.

Now, sitting across from the coffeeshop, he isn't sure. 10 AM comes and goes while he's second-guessing himself, until suddenly it’s fifteen minutes past and he thinks he can't possibly walk in that late for their appointment even if he wanted to.

He's getting ready to turn the key in the ignition when his phone rings. It's a number he doesn't recognize, but he's one of the few people in his generation who always answers regardless. 

"Lieutenant Anderson," he says when he picks up.

"Hello, Hank," the voice on the other end of the line says. "This is Connor. I was wondering if you were going to get out of your car and come inside at any point, or if I should grab coffee and come join you." 

"Oh. Hey." Hank feels his face heating. Connor has a nice voice, with a hint of a pleasant rasp to it - one of the most human he's heard on an android. Hank shifts uncomfortably in his seat. "How did you get my number?" He didn't leave it in the email. 

Connor laughs lightly. "I'm very good at finding things, Lieutenant. And I presume since you're here at all that you haven't lost interest. So. Are you coming in, or should I come out?"

Hank peers out the window at the coffeeshop like he's going to be able to see Connor inside. "You know," he says, "you're kind of a piece of work for someone who's supposed to make people feel good."

"I know," Connor replies, and Hank can hear him smiling, "but you haven't paid me anything yet."

Hank considers it. He's so fucking embarrassed to be here at all, but driving away and going back to his empty house feels a lot like the same shit he's been doing for the last few years, the same sort of thing he's trying to _stop_ doing, because he's hurting himself more than helping, and he's so tired of hurting. 

And sure, it's sad to pay for companionship, but he just needs _someone_.

"I'll come in," he says to Connor.

"Good," Connor says. "I'm at the table in the corner."

Hank hangs up and gets out of the car, crossing the street before he can lose his nerve.

He doesn’t know what to expect from Connor. The most risqué picture on his profile is of him in a neatly pressed but not entirely buttoned white shirt, which might not even have been meant to be risqué at all except that Hank has been thinking for days about that little freckle above Connor’s collarbone.

But Connor is dressed normally, for lack of a better word, in slim jeans and a plain green button down. His LED is in, glowing a gentle blue on his temple, even though he removed it in most of his pictures.

He’s more attractive in person, Hank thinks, throat going a bit dry. How is he more attractive in person?

“Hi, Hank,” Connor says when Hank clears his throat and sits down at his table. He slides a cup of coffee across the table to him. “I’m glad you decided to join me.”

Hank glances over his shoulder, and sure enough, Connor has a clear view out the window to his car. He’s just been sitting in here, watching Hank have his crisis, for the last fifteen minutes.

How very fucking embarassing.

“Sorry,” Hank says, twirling the sleeve on his coffee cup just for something to do and somewhere to avert his eyes. It only helps a little, especially when he can feel Connor carefully watching him. “I haven’t done something like this before.”

Connor hums at that. “First time for everything, I guess. I’m happy to be yours.” Hank looks up to see him tilting his head. “Want to tell me about yourself?”

“Sure,” Hank says, “but if you have my number, I’m sort of wondering what else you know.”

Connor smirks at that. “You’re 53 years old, graduated top of your class, youngest lieutenant in DPD history, married in 2030, divorced in 2035, and you’re being honored at the MACP awards with a medal of valor for your bravery and public service during the revolution.” Connor narrows his eyes. “And you have a dog. Saint Bernard?”

Hank feels hot as he shifts in his seat. He shouldn’t have worn the sweater. “Yeah,” he says, waving a hand awkwardly. “See? You know everything. You should tell me about yourself instead.”

“I will,” Connor says, “but I don’t know why you’re interested in my company, and I’d like to.”

“Oh. I don’t know. I guess it gets old going to those things alone.” 

It _mostly_ is that simple, but Connor presses the matter. (Hank is starting to think he should get used to Connor pressing things if this is going to continue.) 

“Sure,” Connor says, shrugging. “I hear that a lot. But there’s no shortage of androids in this line of work, and humans for that matter.”

“Are you...asking why I picked you?”

Connor props his chin in his palm, smiling sweetly. “Yes. Flatter me.”

Hank coughs around the drink he just took. “Um,” he says, stalling for time, because he figures most people sit here and tell Connor how pretty he is, and...whatever, Hank wants to stand out. He won’t think too hard about why.

“I remember you,” he says finally. “From the resistance broadcast back in November.”

Some of Connor’s carefully crafted veneer falls away at that, and even as he sits up straighter, he looks smaller somehow. “Oh,” he says. “I’m surprised anyone remembers that.”

“Your face was plastered on every news station after you broke those androids out of CyberLife. You were, like, some kind of revolution hero.”

Connor shrugs. “I _was_. That was months ago.” He passes a quarter over his knuckles while he regards Hank with a small smile. “People have mostly moved on from that night. No one is giving me an award for my service.”

“Sorry,” Hank says. It should have occurred to him how this looks, him getting an award for doing something as little as stopping the snipers above Hart Plaza when so many androids did so much more that night.

“Oh, don’t apologize,” Connor says quickly, leaning back in his seat. His crooked smile is back, pulling at the corner of his mouth. “I’ll just have to live vicariously through you...if you still want my company.”

“I do,” Hank says, and Connor grins, crossing his arms over his chest.

“I’m glad. Do you want my LED in or out for your event?”

“I...in, I guess? Or out. Whatever you’re comfortable with.” 

“Aw. You’re cute,” Connor says, and in case Hank wasn’t already flushed enough, he fucking winks at him. “Do you want people to know you’re there with an android or not?” When Hank keeps gaping at him, Connor sighs as if Hank is being thick and says, “Sometimes people want it to be obvious so they can look progressive, or whatever. And since you’re being honored for your service during the revolution...”

“Oh,” Hank says. “I really don’t give a shit about how I look. Seriously. It’s up to you.”

“I’d prefer to take it out to be around so many cops, then. If it’s all the same to you.”

“Yeah,” Hank says quickly. “That’s fine. Whatever you want.”

“I like you,” Connor replies, and for an act, it sounds entirely too genuine, like something Hank could too easily get used to and one day come to miss.

"So," he says, because Connor is looking at him in a way Hank is sure he's carefully practiced, all warm and inviting. He knows that's Connor's job here, to make him feel interesting and wanted, and he finds himself enjoying it, but it feels like a dangerous thing to enjoy too much all at one, a bit like flying too close to the sun. "How long have you been doing the whole...you know. Sugar baby thing."

Connor laughs at that. He has a loud laugh when it's startled out of him. "I usually prefer 'escort'." 

"Oh," Hank says. He's opening his mouth to apologize, and maybe Connor can tell, because he waves him off before he can get a word out.

"That's okay," he says, a small smile on his face. "I can be your baby, if you want me to be."

Hank keeps thinking he's ready for Connor, but every time he does, he ends up with color rising in his cheeks - he’s disarming that way. "Let's see how the first date goes, slick," he says, and Connor studies Hank with a narrow look on his face for just a moment before he grins.

"Okay," he says. "But it's going to go well." 

"Yeah?" Hank asks, smiling despite himself. "You sure?"

Connor gives Hank a reproving glance. "I already told you I like you. And if you're not already sure you like me...you will be."

Hank _is_ sure he likes Connor, but he's trying not to come on too strong. "You're alright," he says, and Connor smiles like he can see Hank's exact thought process.

And maybe he takes a bit of pity on him, because he leans back in his seat and crosses his arms, putting some distance between them. "So. This awards ceremony. I have a grey suit, and ties in most colors. If you want me in something else, you're welcome to take me shopping before next Saturday to pick something out."

The grey suit is fine - Hank doesn't have any preference, and he's sure Connor looks gorgeous in anything. 

So there's really no rational explanation for why he finds himself saying, "Yeah. We can go shopping."

Connor looks just a bit surprised, a little thrown off his game in the same way he was when Hank mentioned seeing him on the broadcasts. Hank decides he likes that expression on Connor's face in the brief moment it takes Connor to recover.

"Okay," Connor says, a smile pulling at the corner of his mouth. "What are you doing tonight?"

Hank smiles, too - it's sort of infectious when Connor does it. "Taking you out, I think"

Connor's LED spins yellow for a moment, and then a notification dings on Hank's phone. He looks down to see a text from the same number that called earlier.

"That's my number, obviously," Connor says, "and my address and apartment number. How's seven?" 

"Seven works," Hank says, although it occurs to him then that maybe Connor had other plans with his free evening. "I'm not fucking up your day off, am I?"

"A little bit," Connor says, winking, "but I don't mind. This is more fun, anyway."

It feels good, having someone want to spend time with him enough to choose him over other plans. Hank suspects Connor knows that, and that’s why he said it at all.

"You're good at this, you know," he says as they walk outside together.

Connor smiles at the compliment - his sweet smile, because Hank is learning that he has several. 

"I know," he says. He kisses Hank's cheek before he turns to go. "I'll see you tonight, Hank."

Hank crosses the road to his car, and he thinks that this doesn't feel nearly as sad as he thought it would.

* * *

Connor stands before his mirror with a file, wedging it under his LED and popping it out.

He usually leaves it out when he’s on his own - it’s just easier, not dealing with the bullshit, not having to worry about the harassment from people who are still bitter about the way the revolution went.

Eventually, maybe, he’ll leave it in when he’s going shopping or taking a walk or seeing a movie, if things ever stabilize. They aren’t there yet, though.

First meetings with clients are the one exception. Connor always leaves it in, because he doesn’t want anyone deluding themselves about what he is or using him as faux human arm candy. It’s intentional, too, that he has it out in the pictures on his profile but wears it for the first meeting - he’s always watching the reaction when men see it. 

It’s one way he gauges whether it’s a good fit, or a fine one where he’ll need to watch himself.

Most of his relationships are just fine ones. He’s usually watching himself and how he acts.He likes a few things about Hank, but what he likes most is that he thinks he’s safe to relax a bit with him.

His first impression from Hank’s email stands - Connor thinks he’s very fucking cute, and sweet, and kind in a sort of sad way, like he’s trying to put something back into the world that it hasn’t given him recently. Connor didn’t mention it at the coffee shop, but of course he knows about Hank’s son’s death in 2035. He can only imagine the sort of toll it’s taken when he’s never lost anybody, or even had anyone to lose at all. Hank drags the weight of it around with him still, that much is plainly obvious.

Connor also didn’t mention that he knows Hank from the revolution, too, that he knew his name long before Hank’s email. He didn’t say anything about how he knew Hank was making himself an enemy of the state when he went up to that roof and confronted the snipers there, and that the only reason anyone is honoring him with a medal for it next week is because the androids won. It’s all a rather performatively progressive political statement to lift Hank up now when no one stood with him that night, an effort on the part of Michigan’s police to look like they were never on the wrong side of all of this.

Connor suspects Hank sees the politics of it, too. He doesn’t blame him for not wanting to go to the awards ceremony alone in light of all of that.

Despite his own complicated relationship with law enforcement, Connor is sort of looking forward to it. There’s a part of him that misses the work he was made for, even if he knows it’s just programming making him feel that way, his inherent lack of fulfillment that he’ll always carry if he isn’t meeting his CyberLife given directives.

Mostly, he’s just looking forward to a night out with someone he likes, even if it is work. 

At 6:55, there’s a knock on his door, and when Connor opens it, he finds Hank standing there.

“Hey,” Connor says, reaching for his coat on the peg by the door. “Most people just text me when they’re here and have me come down to meet them.” 

“Oh,” Hank says, and he looks unsure of himself again. “You gave me your apartment number. I figured you wanted me to come up for you.”

Connor steps outside and turns to lock his door. “Yeah,” he says, elbowing Hank lightly and smiling. “I did.”

Connor follows Hank down the stairs and outside to Hank’s car. It’s been freshly cleaned, Connor can tell when he gets into the passenger seat - there’s a lingering smell of fast food and dog fur, but just to look at it, it’s neatly cared for. 

Connor doesn’t know how he feels about Hank pretending like he has his shit together for his benefit, but he understands it, he supposes. The pictures on his profile, his carefully pressed clothes, the way he always keeps the conversation under his control...Connor is pretending to have his shit together, too.

They have that in common, Connor thinks, along with all the other things.

But this isn’t about him. It’s about Hank. And Connor is good at his job.

When Hank gets into the driver’s seat and starts the car, Connor crosses his legs and looks over at him. “So, _daddy_ ,” he says, nudging Hank with his elbow along with the joke, “where are we going?”

Hank snorts at that. Connor likes making him laugh - he has the distinct sense that Hank hasn’t done much of that lately. “Yeah, don’t call me that,” he says, shaking his head and smiling. “God, you’re a lot to handle.”

Connor puts on a pout that gets another laugh out of Hank. “Anyway,” Hank says, clearing his throat. “I figured we could just park downtown and walk. There are a couple of places on that strip we can hit.” 

“Okay,” Connor says, looking around the car. It makes sense Hank wouldn’t like autonomous vehicles after the circumstances of the accident, but it still takes some kind of stubbornness to insist on a manual car in 2039, and a hell of a lot of determination just to find one in working order. 

“I like your car,” Connor says. “I do,” he adds when Hank gives him a disbelieving look. “It has character.”

“That’s one way to put it,” Hank says. He goes to prop his elbow on the center console, and then immediately withdraws it when he knocks into Connor and their fingers brush over each other

Connor raises an eyebrow. “You can touch me, you know.”

“Uh.” Hank coughs and clears his throat like he does when he’s unsure of the conversation. “I didn’t, but, I mean. It’s okay. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable.” 

“Aw.” Connor reaches for Hank’s hand and pulling it into his lap, winding their fingers together. “I’m not uncomfortable. I like this...unless you’re not interested in physical touch as part of this arrangement?”

Hank flushes at that. “I didn’t say that.” 

Connor smiles, squeezing Hank’s fingers. “Okay. Then you can touch me whenever you want. I want you to.”

Hank shrugs. “I’m going to need you to remind me of that, probably.”

Connor studies the lines on Hank’s face and says, “I can do that.”

All of this is forward, Connor knows, but it’s just easier to blow past some of the awkwardness of the first date, at least in his experience. And he thinks Hank seems like the type who needs a push every now and then, so he keeps Hank’s hand in his lap, their fingers laced together the rest of the drive.

“Do you always take your LED out and put it back in this often?” Hank asks as he parks, gesturing to Connor’s temple when Connor finally lets his hand go to get out of the car.

“Yeah.” When Hank rounds the car to join him on the sidewalk, Connor takes his hand again. “I don’t usually go out with it, unless a client wants me to, but I try to keep it in when I’m home.”

“Doesn’t that hurt? Popping it out?”

“Every time,” Connor says. “But there’s a fine line between being safe and maintaining your identity, and I’m trying to walk it.”

Hank is quiet for a moment. He looks like he wants to understand that, and Connor appreciates him for it.

“You had it in when we met this morning,” Hank finally says. “You’re...what? Gauging a reaction from new people?” 

“Yes,” Connor says. He isn’t surprised Hank gets that part of it - it’s basically an interrogation tactic, showing a suspect incriminating evidence to try to elicit a confession. “I used to just have photos with my LED in on my profile, but then I mostly just got men who really fetishized the android thing, so I learned early on to have it out in the pictures to avoid them. And then I leave it in for the first meeting to make sure there isn’t any confusion about what I am, or too much distaste for me looking the way I actually look.” 

“Huh,” Hank says. “Sorry.”

Connor gives him a small smile. “For what, Hank?”

“I don’t know. That you have to do all that, I guess.”

Connor squeezes his hand. “It’s okay,” he says softly. 

“You know you never told me how long you’ve been doing this when I asked earlier.”

“Oh. Since January, I guess. I was in one of the halfway houses for androids after the revolution, at least for a while, but those weren’t sustainable. I had to figure something else out. So...you know. I obviously know I’m attractive.”

“No shit,” Hank says, sarcastic. “You don’t act like you know _at all_.”

Connor laughs, elbowing Hank in the side. “Anyway. I figured I could do this for a while. It pays the bills, and it isn’t hard work, and most of the men I see are okay” 

“You only date men?”

“Yeah,” Connor says. He’s distinctly aware that he’s never told anyone this before, but no one else has ever asked. “I don’t know how much you can attach human words for sexuality to androids, but regardless, just about any way you cut it, I’m gay. And I try not to mask too much of myself doing this, so I just see men.”

“Huh,” Hank says again, in a way that sounds genuine and interested. It’s nice, how interested he is. Connor has plenty of other people who like him, but he doesn’t know that any of them are that interested by him beyond the ways in which he can make them feel interesting themselves.

Connor slips his arm into Hank’s so he can walk closer to him, and he’s not cold, but he still thinks it’s nice how warm he is. He hears Hank inhaling beside him and knows he’s opening his mouth to say something else, so he squeezes his arm. “It’s my turn, I think,” he says.

“Okay,” Hank concedes. “I told you that you already know everything, though.”

Connor doesn’t know everything, but there is one very particular thing he wants to understand. “How did you end up on that roof at Hart Plaza back in November?”

Hank doesn’t answer at first, and when he does, he says, “It’s not as heroic a story as it seems like it might be.” 

Connor tilts his head. “I didn’t ask for a heroic story.”

Hank sighs. “I mean, they had me covering android crimes at the DPD, and I saw some shit that was...well, you know. You probably saw it, too. It was fucked up. So I went up there to stop it, but I also didn’t give a shit whether I lived or died. It’s easy to do shit that looks brave when you don’t care about that, or about much else.”

Connor wants to ask Hank if he actually didn’t care about anything that night, because it seems like Hank’s problem is actually that he cares too much. He doesn’t push it, though. “I was down there,” he says instead. “In the plaza that night.”

“Yeah,” Hank says, voice soft. “I know you were.”

There’s plenty to talk about there alone, but the revolution is too heavy a topic for right now, and Hank is stiff beside him. Connor squeezes his arm, trying to work some of that tension out of him. “Your turn.”

“Oh,” Hank says. “I don’t know. You have any ground rules? No kissing on the mouth, or whatever?”

Connor runs a search on the phrase and then tilts his head. “Like in Pretty Woman?” 

“Yeah.”

Connor can see Hank’s cheeks heating again. “Not really,” he replies, edging that carefully practiced cheerful note back into his voice. “I don’t do sexual favors, usually, but I’m open to talking about it after a few dates if you want.” 

He says it mostly because he thinks Hank is cute when he’s flustered, and Hank doesn’t disappoint with the startled little sputter he reacts with. “That’s illegal, you know,” he says when he recovers. 

“It’s actually not for androids. Not yet, anyway. Most of the Eden Club laws are still in place,” Connor says, smiling. “Keep up, Lieutenant.”

Connor knows Hank doesn’t expect sex from him. He knows because Hank doesn’t seem like the type, but also because his profile is inaccurate - it says he isn’t equipped for sexual activity, mostly because he intentionally didn’t update it after the upgrade. He figured it would be easier to pick and choose who he told, and safer (although of course it’s been two months, and he hasn’t told anyone yet.) He justified that expense by telling himself it was for work, in the same way the upgrade that allows him to drink was for work, to make him a better companion.

Really, though, they were both for him. Connor isn’t ashamed of what he is, but it is difficult to feel at home as an android in a world that’s still very human. It’s easier, being able to relate to things the way they do, and far less lonely.

This, right now, is the closest Connor has come to ever confessing that to anyone. And he knows he isn’t really close, that all Hank knows is that he’s ribbing him again, but there’s still some sort of comfort in it.

“I’m really not looking for that,” Hank says again. “I wouldn’t subject you to...you know. All of this.” 

Connor makes a face and runs his hand down Hank’s arm to lace their fingers together inside his jacket pocket. “Here’s a ground rule,” he says. “No self-deprecation, okay? I don’t like it, and I want you to feel good about yourself when we’re together.”

Hank’s breath fogs in the air when he sighs. “Okay,” he says softly.

Connor thinks about stopping in the middle of the sidewalk and kissing him. 

He doesn’t, of course - it’s their first night together, and Hank is still struggling with letting himself have something good, and Connor doesn’t want to overwhelm him when this still feels delicate.

But he thinks about it.

"So," Connor says, and he's sure it probably seems like he's trying to distract Hank, but in reality he's trying to distract himself just as much. "How do you want to tell your colleagues we met? Most people usually prefer something other than the truth." 

"Oh," Hank says. "A bar probably makes the most sense."

Connor smiles. "That isn't very original, Hank."

"Yeah, maybe not. But it's probably the only thing they would believe." Hank shrugs when Connor looks up at him. "I don't really meet people. Or go out anywhere else, for that matter."

Connor would like to prod at that, too, but he forces himself to let it alone. "Okay," he says. "A bar, then. We can say I recognized you from some of the news coverage after the revolution and approached you." 

Connor squeezes Hank's fingers, his hand warm inside Hank's pocket. "Would you like to tell them we're dating?"

"I think saying you're my date for the night is probably good enough."

"You sure? I'd be your boyfriend if you wanted me to."

Hank is intentionally avoiding Connor's gaze by staring ahead, but that doesn't stop Connor from looking at him. "Yeah," Hank says. "I'm sure. If we say we're dating then I'll have to say we broke up when you aren't around anymore."

That pricks at something uncomfortable inside Connor. It's a reminder that he's had plenty of clients who only use him a few times and then move on. It's usually because they can't afford it, but Connor doesn't think that's going to be the problem with Hank.

He mostly thinks Hank's just uncomfortable with his own happiness, and especially afraid of having some good in his life. When you've lost as much as he has, Connor supposes, good things are just things you have to be afraid of losing.

Connor doesn't know how to stop that from happening, but he knows he doesn't want it to. "Okay," he replies softly, even as he wishes he had something else to say. "I can be your date, then."

"Okay," Hank says. He still isn't looking at Connor. "There's a menswear place up on the corner here."

Connor feels guilty for this part. He has more than the grey suit he mentioned to Hank in his closet right now - he always does - but he always says he just has the one. The more things his clients buy him, the more he has to sell once they're gone. It's a reasonable percentage of his income. 

He honestly thought Hank was going to say the grey suit was fine; he doesn't at all present as someone who cares much about his or anyone else's appearance.

But Connor trails after Hank into the store anyway, and he sorts through a few jackets before he says, “Are you going to wear your dress uniform? I don't like matching too closely, but I can at least coordinate my colors with yours..."

“Oh. I wasn’t going to. It doesn’t fit that well anymore.”

Connor looks over his shoulder at him. “What are you going to wear, then?”

"Um," Hank says. Connor raises an eyebrow. "I don't know," he says, defensive. "It's just some old black suit." 

"An old black suit," Connor repeats, enunciating each word. "Does it fit you, at least? Do you have a picture of yourself in it?"

"Yeah, it fits. Jesus. No, I don't have a picture."

Connor runs through every publicly available photo of Hank, from social media pages and dating profiles and news articles, until he finds something. "Is this it?" he asks, holding up a picture of Hank from a wedding last year on his palm display.

"Yeah, that's it," Hank says. "God, you're creepy."

"That's what you get for hiring an investigative prototype." Connor turns back to the picture and studying it for a moment. "That absolutely doesn't fit. You look unkempt."

"I mean." Hank gestures to himself. "That's kind of how I look."

Connor rolls his eyes. "No, it isn't. Or it shouldn't be, anyway." 

He puts the jacket he's holding back and starts rifling through the larger sizes. "Look, I probably have ten suits at home, at least, and I will show up wearing my nicest one and looking very perfect as long as you buy yourself something tonight instead." Connor pulls one from the rack and folds it over his arm. "Sorry. For lying to you."

Hank snorts. "You think I believed you do this for a living and you only have one suit?"

Connor blinks, processors stuttering. "I..."

Hank shakes his head, smiling slightly. "Keep up, kid."

Connor’s social subroutine catches up after a moment. (He actually likes that, being caught off-guard. His mind is designed to move so quickly that it’s almost welcome when someone can force it to slow down for a second.) “Why are we here, then?” he asks. “If you knew I didn’t need something to wear, I mean.” 

Hank shrugs. “I don’t know. I just didn’t have any other plans, and I didn’t mind getting you something new.”

Connor tilts his head. “Aw. You like me.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Hank says, scuffing the toe of his boot along the floor. “Finish picking whatever shit you’re going to make me try on and let’s go.”

Connor wonders if it’s a problem, how much he likes Hank, or if he should be worried that he’s thinking about kissing him again, a little thought subroutine playing on a loop in his head. “Yeah,” he says, clearing his throat. “Okay.” 

The first suit Hank tries on is the one they end up going with, although he begrudgingly tries on the rest at Connor’s insistence. It’s classic, black and tailored, with a neatly pressed dark green shirt underneath, and Connor isn’t too proud to admit that his systems stutter a bit when Hank first steps out of the dressing room in it.

“You’re sure this looks good?” Hank asks, fussing with the jacket in front of the mirror.

Connor takes the tie he’s holding and puts himself between Hank and the mirror, smoothing his hands over the lapels of his jacket. “Yeah,” he says, holding the tie up for Hank to see and starting to tie it for him. “You look...”

“Like I’m trying too hard.”

Connor rolls his eyes and pokes Hank in the chest. “I was going to say hot.”

Hank doesn’t have a quick response to that, beyond a soft “Oh” and his heart rate picking up as Connor finishes tying his tie. _Good_.

Hank clears his throat, glancing away. “You should still get yourself something.”

“I really do have...”

“I know,” Hank cuts him off. “But those are suits other guys bought you.” 

Connor quirks his eyebrow, a small smile lifting the corner of his mouth. “You have a bit of a possessive streak there, Lieutenant?”

Hank stifles a laugh. “No. It’s just...that’s how this works, isn’t it? You spend time with me, and I give you money and buy you shit?” 

“I’ll tell you what,” Connor says, tugging on the lapel of Hank’s jacket. “Tonight’s on me.”

Hank sighs, but he doesn’t say anything else about it until much later, after he’s tried on the other suits and he’s getting changed back into his clothes. “Hey,” he calls from the dressing room while Connor waits outside. “What were you going to do tonight?”

“What do you mean?”

“Earlier, when I asked if I was fucking up your night off and you said a little bit. What were you going to do?” 

“Oh,” Connor says. He thinks briefly about lying, but he’s already told Hank several of his secrets tonight. “There’s a drive-in theater that’s been showing old Pixar movies on Thursday nights. I’ve been going to see them. I’m trying to experience the same pop culture most adults have.”

Hank steps out of the dressing room. “Can’t you just...I don’t know. Watch those instantly in your head?”

Connor smiles. “It’s not really the same.”

“Fair enough,” Hank says. “Can I take you? Since you didn’t get anything out of the rest of this?” 

“You really don’t have to...”

“Come on. I like Pixar.” When Connor raises an eyebrow, Hank laughs and says, “Everybody my age likes Pixar, Con. We grew up during its heyday.”

“Yeah?” Connor asks, his smile broadening. 

Hank has a nice smile, Connor decides in that moment, especially when it reaches his eyes. “Yeah,” he says. “You still want to go?”

“Sure,” Connor says. He’s worried his expression is maybe too genuine, or at least too soft, but fuck it. “I’d like that.”

Connor waits outside while Hank pays, lighting a cigarette in the cold. Usually he doesn’t smoke around clients, but he doesn’t think Hank will mind. And besides, he needs to clear his head, and letting the smoke cloud his sensory units so he can’t focus on anything else is the best way he knows how.

“Hey,” Hank says when he joins Connor outside. “I didn’t know you could smoke”

“It’s not on my profile,” Connor says, reaching for Hank’s hand as they start walking. “I’ll put it out before we get to your car”

“That’s okay,” Hank says. “I don’t mind” 

Connor thinks about kissing him again, and he takes a long drag on the cigarette before that little thought routine can get stuck on a loop again.

“Does that even do anything for you?” Hank asks.

“It narrows my focus down to one point, which is...relaxing, I guess is the word. I’m hyper-aware of everything around me all the time, and sometimes that’s exhausting.”

Connor doesn’t mention the thoughts he’s trying to stop.

When they get to the drive-in, Hank pays for their car, and he retrieves a few folded blankets that Connor wouldn’t have guessed he had from his trunk once they’re parked. “If I didn’t know better, I’d think you planned on this,” Connor says, spreading one of the blankets over the hood of Hank’s car.

“They’re for when I take Sumo to the dog park and all the benches are taken,” Hank says. “You can drink but not eat, right? I’m going to run over to the concession stand.”

Connor hoists himself onto the hood of the car and settles back against the windshield. “Right. No soda, though - I don’t like the way the sugar makes my biocomponents feel.”

Connor watches Hank go, and he lights another cigarette. 

He spreads the other blanket over his lap even though he isn’t cold, and he realizes that there are traces of grass and dog hair on it, and he thinks that says something about Hank, something he likes, that the last few years haven’t been so kind to him but he still takes such good care of his dog. 

Hank brings him an unsweetened iced tea, and Connor sips it while Hank climbs onto the hood beside him. “You’re a good date,” he says, knocking his elbow into Hank’s.

“Yeah? You’re turning out to be a cheaper one than I thought.”

Connor smiles. “Don’t get used to it.” 

“No, of course not,” Hank says, laughing. He nods at Connor’s drink. “What’s the point of blowing money on an upgrade to let you drink if you still can’t have sugar? There’s sugar in everything.”

“I _can_ have it. I just have to run some internal cleaning protocols that are arduous and inconvenient when I do. But I drink it when I’m out, usually - there’s sugar in most cocktails, and that’s usually what people buy me.”

“But...you can’t get drunk, can you?”

Connor shakes his head.

“Huh,” Hank says. “Seems like a lot of expense and inconvenience just for appearances.” 

“I don’t know,” Connor replies, shrugging. “At least I’ve experienced it now. That’s something.”

“Yeah. I guess it is.” Hank nods at the title screen for Toy Story on the screen. “This is my favorite Pixar movie.”

“Is it?” Connor asks. “I’ve been avoiding it until now.” 

“How come?”

“I don’t know,” Connor says. “Things like this piss me off sometimes.” Hank raises an eyebrow, and Connor knows it’s a vague thing to say and that he has to explain. “It’s just...people have been exploring this theme in media for decades, even in children’s movies.” He gestures to the screen. “Sometimes that’s a hard pill to swallow, that people have consumed media where beings that aren’t human still have their humanity, but that when androids were actually developed, so much shit still happened to us.” 

As a rule, Connor doesn’t talk about the revolution with clients. It’s a heavy subject, and that’s mostly why, but even when they ask, he doesn’t give them anything.

It comes out easy, though, the way most things have tonight. “Yeah,” Hank says, tugging the blanket Connor has on his lap over so they can share. “I guess I can see that.”

Connor shifts so he can put his head on Hank’s shoulder. “Thank you for bringing me,” he says softly. “Usually I just bring an autonomous cab and pay the meter for it to sit here for a few hours. This is nicer.”

“That’s...kind of sad, isn’t it?” Hank asks.

Connor shrugs. He doesn’t say, “Sometimes I’m kind of sad,” even if he knows they have that in common, too. 

He turns to kiss Hank’s cheek, wrapping an arm around him when Hank shivers against the cold. “I’m having a nice time,” he says softly.

“Yeah,” Hank says, and Connor can feel his breath in his hair. “Me too.”

Connor feels reasonably sure it’s just because Hank doesn’t know where else to put his arm with the way Connor is curled into him, but he wraps an arm around him, squeezing his shoulder, and the sigh that comes out of him in response is entirely involuntary. 

Connor catalogues this feeling, being surrounded and enveloped and warm under the blankets. He thinks maybe it will help with stasis - it’s a manual command to put himself into it, so that’s no problem, but he struggles sometimes with the thoughts in his head, something like the android equivalent of dreams, while he’s out. He’s been trying to collect sensory data from moments when he feels safe to play on a loop while he’s asleep to override that mental process.

And this is one.

Connor is distinctly aware that they’re one of the only cars in the lot - it’s March in Detroit, and the drive-in is priced cheap during the early spring months when it’s still cold for a reason. 

Connor almost likes it better like this - it’s easier to pretend they’re alone entirely. And the other few cars are so far away, they might as well be.

“Hank,” he says, feeling the soft brush of Hank’s shirt against his cheek when he lifts his head.

“Yeah?”

“Is it going to confuse you if I kiss you?”

Hank squeezes his shoulder again. “You don’t have to.”

“I want to. If that’s okay.” 

Connor knows this part is fragile. Their relationship is transactional, and so Connor knows it might be difficult for Hank to understand that he can want to pay his bills and need to work and still _want_ to kiss him, too, that they aren’t mutually exclusive.

He shouldn’t have asked tonight, probably. It’s too new, and Hank is still too uncomfortable with putting himself into this situation and trying to do something that will help him feel better, or at least less alone. And Connor feels sure he doesn’t see that it can be transactional without being any less real. 

He shouldn’t have asked.

But Hank still nods against him after a moment and says, “If you want to.” There’s a forced casual air to his tone, an attempt not to sound nervous, that Connor sees right through, but he doesn’t comment on it. 

Instead, he shifts against Hank, sitting up against him and putting a hand on his cheek. He wonders how someone can look so sad and so kind in the moment before he kisses him.

And it’s nice. Hank puts a hand on Connor’s neck, and his arm slips around his waist, and Connor feels the texture of Hank’s beard under his palm, and they kiss, languid and unhurried, under the blankets, and if Connor commits this to memory, too, he’ll never tell.

The kiss is delicate in the same way their situation is, in the same way Connor thinks Hank is, open-mouthed but always reserved and never desperate, their tongues occasionally finding each other in a gentle touch but little more.

When they part, Connor leans his forehead against Hank's, his eyes closed. "I really like you," he whispers.

He's aware of everything in that moment, the warmth of the blankets, Hank's hand on his neck, Hank's thumb absently stroking his jawline like a reflex, Hank's beard under his fingers and his heart under his hand, and Connor realizes all at once that it's like smoking, that for just a moment he can't hear the movie or the passing cars on the highway in the distance or anything, that his focus is narrowed down to this single point.

Hank smoothes a hand through Connor's hair and kisses his forehead. Connor has told Hank he likes him three times now, and Hank keeps deflecting any kind of response, but that's okay. Connor just wants Hank to know he means it, even if he doesn't know how to respond to it just yet.

He thinks Hank probably needs to hear things like that a few times before he believes them, anyway.

Connor kisses him one more time, just a quick peck on the lips, before he returns his head to Hank's shoulder.

Admittedly they somehow manage to lie closer together after that, Connor's leg tangled ever so slightly with Hank's under the blankets, Hank's cheek on the top of Connor's head. Connor doesn't feel sleepy the same way humans do, but he does feel warm enough, and like he's floating over himself, his limbs heavy enough that he's reluctant to move when the credits roll.

"What did you think?" Hank asks him, and Connor finds his hand under the blankets.

"I think it might be my favorite, too." Connor wonders if he's talking about the movie or the experience. He isn't sure, but he also doesn't know if it really matters. The way he processes sensory data makes it so easy for him to associate certain sounds or smells with an occurrence, something good or bad. This movie is tied with that kiss for him, forever.

He downloads the movie as they get back into the car. He can set it to play while he's in stasis, too. He already feels warm thinking of it.

Connor tries to muster up some of the breezy, confident energy he usually tries to exude with his dates on the drive home, although it feels difficult, like Hank has unmoored him from that construct of himself and can't quite find his way back to it. 

"Do you want me to send you a picture of the suit I'll be wearing next week?" he finally asks, and Hank shrugs.

"That's okay. I trust you. You can surprise me, or whatever."

"Okay," Connor says softly. He reaches for Hank's hand and settles back into his seat, watching the streetlamps pass them by outside.

When they get back to Connor's apartment, Hank walks him up without asking if Connor wants him to, and Connor kisses Hank again at the door and then leans back against it, hesitant to fish his keys out of his pocket and let himself inside.

"Hey, listen," he says, reaching out and tugging Hank's sleeve. "You don't owe me anything for phone calls or texts, so if you want to talk..."

"Oh," Hank says, rubbing the back of his neck. "Sure." 

Connor doubts Hank is going to take him up on that, but he wishes he would. He thinks that, maybe more than anything, Hank could use someone to talk to

Connor gives him a small smile. "I'll see you next week."

"Yeah," Hank says softly. "Night, Con"

Connor watches him go as he unlocks his door, and once he’s inside, he slouches on the edge of his bed, unbuttoning the top few buttons of his shirt and lying back. He fishes his cigarettes from his pocket and lights another one. He’s not allowed to smoke in his apartment, but fuck it.

It occurs to him all at once, with something cold like guilt settling in his gut, that they talked more about him than they did about Hank. Connor doesn’t know how that happened. He’s always in control of the conversation. 

But Hank asked. And fuck, he knows he’s lonely sometimes, but is he really so bad off that all it takes is someone _asking_ for him to forget how to do his job?

For a single insane moment, Connor thinks about calling Hank. He’ll still be driving home - Connor wouldn’t be interrupting anything. But what would he say? “Sorry we didn’t spend enough time talking about you to touch on your son’s death, or why your car smells like alcohol, or how I can help you hate yourself less? I’d like to discuss those things next time.”? 

There’s nothing he could say that would help anything, so he just has to sit with that sense of failure he hates so much churning in his gut until he sees Hank again next week.

Connor figures he can text him at least, so he does. “I had a really nice time,” he writes. “I go to that theater every Thursday...if you ever want to come with me again, I’d like that. Good night, Hank.”

Hank’s reply comes fifteen minutes later, which is about how long his drive home should have taken him. “Sweet dreams, Connor,” is all it says, but he’s typing something else, too, and it’s not more than another minute before it comes through. “Wait. Do you dream?”

Connor can’t stop the stupid smile that spreads over his face. “Yeah. I do something like dreaming.” 

Hank starts typing, stops, then starts again. Connor imagines him just inside his door, trying to figure out what to say.

“Cool,” is what he finally lands on. “Then have sweet dreams, Con.”

Connor recalls the sensory data he catalogued when he and Hank were cuddled together on the hood of Hank’s car, and he thinks maybe he just might.

Usually Connor ‘dreams’ of the revolution. It’s part of his AI protocols designed to help him learn from his mistakes and failures - he was never supposed to be anything more than a prototype used to develop the latest RK model, after all. So he lives it every night - deviating, that cold dread in the pit of his stomach, being struck across the face by the butt of a gun in Hart Plaza so forcefully that his vision shorted out in one eye. It’s taken months for him to learn how to override that process with positive stimuli so he doesn’t have to dread stasis so much. 

He sets a subroutine to play Toy Story after he’s asleep, and keeps that sensory data from earlier, Hank’s arms around him, on a loop, and he takes himself offline with a small smile on his face

* * *

For the next week, Hank fluctuates between feeling mildly optimistic about his arrangement with Connor and very fucking stupid.

He goes to bed on Thursday night and he feels okay. 

Not really _good_ , exactly, but nowhere near as bad as he usually does on a daily basis, even when there’s no fucking reason for him to, either.

He thinks about holding Connor’s hand, and kissing him at the theater, and he knows it’s part of their deal, but he doesn’t feel stupid for that, either.

On Friday night, he’s vomiting in Jimmy’s bathroom and thinking that this is all really fucking pathetic. He likes Connor, but Connor is still a companion he had to pay for, and isn’t that so fucking sad that he’s _that_ lonely? 

He thinks about texting Connor, or calling him, just because Connor has a way of somehow being forthright about their arrangement but also making Hank feel less like shit about it, and he could use some of that right now.

(In the end, in the same way he’s frequently thought about calling Jeff or Ben over the years when he needs someone just to leave their numbers undialed, he doesn’t. There’s no hell deeper than his own shame.)

On Saturday, Hank puts on the suit Connor made him buy and thinks there’s nothing any number of well-fitting or expensive clothes can do to fix the obvious mess he is.

On Sunday, he tries it on again and he thinks he looks okay.

He’s used to the pendulum swing, back and forth, but he always seems to end at the lowest point anyway.

By the following week, Hank has mostly made up his mind not to go to the MACP awards, because going means trying, it means putting on the suit that fits and picking up the pretty android he hired to stand next to him and flirt with him, and it means accepting an award he doesn’t think he deserves and that he’s only getting because Michigan’s police force as a whole knows they need to rewrite history and make it look like they were on the right side that night.

He means to call Connor the day before the event and thank him for his time and tell him it’s off, and to ask if he can pay him for his efforts anyway since he feels guilty as fuck for Connor’s situation, even if he isn’t responsible for it.

Connor ends up texting him first in a move that Hank would think was creepy android intuition, except that he’s pretty sure Connor probably knew he would get cold feet. 

“Hi, Hank,” the text says. “I’m looking forward to seeing you tomorrow. I know you said you didn’t care about seeing my suit before the event, but would you like a preview anyway?”

Hank means to type, “Yeah, we’re not going. Sorry I’m so fucked up. I hope things come together for you soon - you deserve it.”

That’s not what his stupid, traitorous thumbs write, though. Instead, what he sends back to Connor is, “Hey kid. Sure.”

What comes through is a cropped picture of Connor in an olive linen jacket, a white shirt with subtle green and tan stripes unbuttoned underneath - it matches the green shirt he picked out for Hank in the most subtle way. Hank can’t see his face, but he can see that little freckle on Connor’s collarbone that interested him before, and the first peek of the metal ring of his thirium pump.

It’s not particularly risqué, and even if it does get Hank’s heart rate to pick up ever so slightly, he doesn’t think that’s the intention.

Or at least, not the only one.

There’s a lot in the picture, really. Connor’s care in picking something that matches so well, and his trust in showing Hank the thirium pump, something he can’t cover up or take out to pass for human.

Hank thinks that’s the point, more than the sliver of pale skin, that Connor is trying to meet him halfway.

He thinks of Connor saying, “I obviously know I’m attractive,” and he thinks that may be true, but that maybe Connor needs his own sort of reassurance from time to time, and that he’s seeking it now.

And Hank doesn’t want to fuck that up. 

So instead, he writes back, “You look really good, Con,” and Connor replies, “:) See you tomorrow, Hank,” and Hank is in this really fucking deep, but he thinks maybe Connor is, too.

Connor is a weird little mystery, Hank thinks, because for all the self-assured confidence he carries with him, there’s something...well, fuck, what’s even the word for it? Raw? A little fragile? It’s an odd thing, because Hank doesn’t think the confidence is an act, exactly. He thinks that’s very real, right down to the way Connor seems to like one-upping him.

But Connor seems like he needs some reassurance, too, like he’s lonely and doesn’t entirely know where to get it from, like he wants to be accepted or needed or loved.

Which...yeah. Join the club. 

Still, that’s really why Hank talks himself into keeping their date. Because he can always make himself do shit if it’s for someone else when he can’t do it for himself.

(And it’s probably very delusional to think he’s doing any good at all for Connor that Connor couldn’t find elsewhere, but. _But._ It’s the lie he has to tell himself.)

So Hank goes home, and he drinks a little but not a lot, and he lays out the suit Connor picked, and he looks at that picture of Connor on his phone, and yeah, he saves it too. 

It takes a concerted effort on his part to ignore the shame curling in his gut when he walks up to Connor’s apartment to pick him up the next night, mostly because he has a flower for Connor’s suit that he picked up in his hand, and that feels a bit too much like buying his own con.

Connor opens the door before he can knock. “Hi,” he says, putting a hand on Hank’s cheek and kissing the other. “I heard you coming.”

Hank raises an eyebrow. “From how far away?”

Connor smiles, looking sheepish. “I heard you park your car. Your engine sounds distinctive.” 

“Huh. Creepy,” Hank says, but there’s an edge of fondness to it that he doesn’t mask well, and Connor smiles. “Um,” Hank says, awkwardly holding out the plastic container with the white flower inside. “This is for you.”

Connor’s smile is too genuine for the situation, genuine enough that it makes Hank’s heart ache a bit. It’s that glimpse of the fragility he’s always masking that does it, mostly. 

Connor taking the boutonnière and fixing it to his suit gives Hank the opportunity to look at him properly. It’s a slim cut, an olive color that almost leans grey, with the same pale-striped shirt underneath that Hank has already seen (and spent more time than he should admit looking at).

“I need to take my LED out still,” Connor says. It’s spinning calm blue on his temple. “You’re early.” 

Hank would tell him that he left his house early because his stomach was churning with anxious energy and he needed to at least be moving while it did, and that Connor is the only part of tonight he’s looking forward to, but he doesn’t quite know how to say that. 

“Take your time,” is what comes out instead.

Hank assumed Connor would go to the bathroom to fit the file underneath the little biocomponent and gouge it out, until Connor crosses the room to the mirror on the wall instead and Hank realizes he doesn’t have one. 

He doesn’t have a kitchen, either. Connor’s building was obviously completely rundown not that long ago, and the studio apartment was clearly renovated specifically for androids by some cheap landlord looking to make the same rent on what’s essentially just a box. Connor has it decorated nicely and kept neat, but that’s more a testament to him than the unit.

“You like living here?” Hank asks, watching the way Connor winces when he takes the LED out with the file.

“It’s okay,” Connor says, shrugging. “You ready to go, handsome?” 

What Hank would rather do, honestly, is stay here with Connor, or take him anywhere else. But he’s still not in great standing at work, and Jeff was quite clear about his expectations regarding Hank’s attendance, and part of the reason he hired a date was because he knew he wouldn’t go otherwise and needed someone to hold him accountable.

“Yeah,” Hank says, following him out. Connor is radiating that same cheeky, flirty energy from the coffee shop, but the question still makes his cheeks heat, mostly because he thinks Connor isn’t any less genuine when he’s like this. “You look really nice, Con.”

“I think I promised I would look ‘perfect’, actually,” Connor says, a teasing glint in his eye when he turns to lock his door. 

Hank takes his hand as they start down the stairs. “Yeah. You look perfect.”

Connor has probably heard that before, Hank thinks, but he still looks like he never has.

"How was your week?" Connor asks once they're in the car and he's casually reached for Hank's hand and laced their fingers together.

Hank doesn't think now is the time to tell him about the pendulum swinging, although he does briefly consider it. "It was okay. Long." 

"Because you missed me?" Connor asks, nudging Hank's elbow with his - what he does when he's letting Hank know he's joking, Hank has realized.

Hank glances at him with a small smile. "Yeah. Something like that."

Is there really that much harm in playing into the game? If he has to have these wounds that don't seem like they're ever going to heal, there can't be anything wrong with at least putting a balm on them...

Connor squeezes Hank’s hand. "I missed you, too."

...especially when he says things like that. If nothing else, being with Connor has made Hank all too aware of how much he's missed being wanted by anyone.

There's valet service at the hotel where the ceremony is being held, but Hank pulls into the lot anyway, and then he sits there for a while once he's shut the car off. "You're nervous," Connor says after a few moments pass. He hasn't let go of Hank's hand.

"How do you do that?" Hank asks. "How do you always know?"

Connor smiles softly and lifts their joined hands. "Pulse patterns."

"You're always listening to mine?" 

"Feeling it, sometimes," Connor says, squeezing Hank's fingers for emphasis.

"Huh. Weird." Hank thinks Connor has to know by now that he says he's creepy or weird with complete fondness. He likes how different Connor is. It's its own reward figuring him out.

"Hank," Connor says softly, and that's all he says, but there's a request in it, too, and Hank knows he's asking what he's thinking about and why he seems sad without saying the words.

"I don't know," Hank says. "I haven't liked going to shit for work in...fuck, years. It's just...it's hard to be at functions like this without remembering who I used to be, and that's...I don't know. Work is probably where I feel it the most."

"It," Connor repeats, and Hank sighs.

"How fucking sad I am."

Connor's face softens somehow, and he reaches for Hank's arm with his free hand. "Do you want to go?"

They can't leave - or, at least, Hank can't - but it's a nice thought. "Where would you want to go?"

Connor huffs a little laugh at that. "I’m not sure. I actually don't mind being here. I'm looking forward to seeing some of my old colleagues." 

Hank raises an eyebrow. "Did you...like any of the guys at the other precinct?"

The corner of Connor's mouth lifts. "Hated them. But I'd like them to see that I'm doing okay. And if I can piss them off by forcing them into a position where they have to make polite conversation with me, even better." Connor shrugs. "I have the capacity for some significant pettiness when it suits me."

Hank laughs outright at that. "Jesus Christ," he says, and Connor's smile broadens at the mirth in his voice. "Okay. You tell me who you want to track down, and we can make rounds."

"Okay." Connor hesitates, but then he leans over and kisses Hank on the mouth, sighing contentedly into his mouth when Hank raises a hand to tangle his fingers in his hair. 

"You ready?" Connor murmurs when they part, and maybe it's because of the night or the suit or Connor's eyes being so bright, but their fingers are still laced together, and Hank raises his hand to kiss the back of Connor's.

"Yeah," he says. "Let's go."

Connor slips an arm around Hank’s waist as they start across the parking lot, and he catches Hank’s arm by the wrist and drops it across his shoulders, and he fits so well there and looks so pleased with himself that Hank really can’t do anything other than pull him a bit closer so he can kiss his hair.

It’s only because he still has an arm around Connor’s shoulders when they walk into the hotel lobby that Hank feels him stiffen at all. “Hey,” Hank says, squeezing his shoulder and searching his face. “Are you okay?” 

“I’m fine,” Connor says, but he’s still looking at something across the room, and Hank tries to follow his gaze.

And then he sees him, and he remembers all at once the talk around the precincts when the FBI was first called in, that they were bringing some highly advanced android prototype with them. Connor worked out of the 6th precinct, but he reported to the federal agents on the case...including the one Hank decked a few months back.

“Perkins?” Hank asks, and Connor nods, blinking like he does when he’s trying to clear his head. 

“My chassis is still damaged from him,” Connor says. He phrases it like it’s a passing comment, but Hank’s mind grinds over it.

“Wait, what the fuck?” he asks, and Connor sighs, taking him by the hand and pulling him over to the bar.

“We were at Eden Club looking over a crime scene,” Connor says. He’s still glancing at Perkins occasionally across the room. “The two deviants were still on the premises, and when we found them in storage, I had a clean shot, but I let them go.” Connor nods at Perkins. “He didn’t like that. He knocked me down and kept kicking me... I had broken some of my directives by that point, but I was programmed not to hurt humans, so I just. Waited for him to stop.” Connor takes Hank’s hand and puts it inside his jacket, over where his left ribs would be. “You feel that?”

Hank does. There’s an indent in Connor’s chassis deep enough that it’s readily apparent to the touch.

“Jesus,” Hank says. “CyberLife didn’t repair that?”

“It was assessed as minor field damage. I think they might have fined the FBI for it when they accessed my memory, but it wasn’t worth repairing.”

“They fined them,” Hank repeats. “That’s fucking it?”

“Yeah,” Connor says, shrugging. “I knocked him out in the evidence room when they were trying to recall me a few days later, though.” 

“ _Good_ ,” Hank says. He trails his fingers over the indent one more time, tracing the shape of it through Connor’s shirt. “He’s a fucking prick. I actually hit him back in November, too. Guess that wasn’t his month.”

Connor smiles at that. “Did you really?” 

Hank glances across the room at Perkins. “Yeah. I’ll go fuck him up again if you want me to.”

Connor’s smile broadens, and he reaches up and drags his fingers through Hank’s beard. “Don’t ruin your night. I would like a drink, though...if you want to do something for me.” 

“Yeah,” Hank says. “Sure, sweetheart. Is whiskey okay?”

The endearment just comes out, and Connor certainly hears it, because he smiles while Hank’s cheeks heat. “Sure,” he says softly, and Hank’s glad that he’s at least kind enough not to tease him for it.

Hank orders two whiskeys, and while they wait, leaning against the bar, he nudges Connor and says, “That shouldn’t have happened to you. I’m sorry it did.”

“It’s okay.” Connor shrugs. “And if it isn’t, I made him pay for it in the end, and I guess you did, too. We can say you hit him in my honor.” 

In reality, Hank hit Perkins because he was pissed off and hungover and because Perkins was a fucking prick standing in his way...but he thinks he likes this better.

“Is that crack something they can repair?” Hank asks, realizing all at once he doesn’t really know anything about Connor’s maintenance, or even how his body is put together. “CyberLife, or whoever androids go to these days?”

Connor nods. “They could. I’ve never looked into it, though.”

“Does it hurt?” 

Connor lifts a hand to his side. “I’m aware of it. It isn’t pressing on any of my biocomponents, though, so it isn’t really pain. Just...an odd sort of feeling.”

“Connor,” Hank says reprovingly, and Connor gives him a dim smile.

“What, Hank?” 

“Sorry, I just...you have an upgrade so you can drink shit that isn’t even designed to do anything for you, but you still have unrepaired damage from back when you were CyberLife property.”

“This is for work,” Connor says, raising his glass and taking another sip. “Are you questioning how I spend my money? Because I don’t have much of it, and there have been other things I’ve wanted to do with myself more than repairing damage that doesn’t bother me _that_ much.”

“No,” Hank says quickly, although he supposes he actually is, at least a little bit. “No, I’m just...would you let me pay for it? The repair?”

Connor swirls his drink in his glass, staring at it. “I’m a unique model. I’m not cheap to patch up.”

“And I have money in the bank. That’s our whole arrangement. Come on, Connor.”

Connor considers it a moment, and then he says, “I don’t know.” 

Hank sighs. “What’s your hesitation?”

“Personal principle, mostly. I don’t accept money specifically intended for repairs or upgrades. I don’t want clients thinking they have a stake in my body, or some kind of claim to it.”

It’s reasonable, and smart, but Hank is still the smallest bit hurt. “I wouldn’t think that.”

“Oh, I trust that you wouldn’t,” Connor says. “I don’t trust anyone else, but I trust you too much, and that’s its own sort of problem.”

Hank scrubs a hand over his face before he looks at Connor. “Can you think about it, at least?” 

“Yeah,” Connor says softly. “I will. Thank you...I don’t want to sound ungrateful for the offer.”

“You don’t, sweetheart. I get it.”

Connor doesn’t owe him anything. He really doesn’t. But Hank can’t pretend the stark reminder of their business relationship doesn’t sting. 

“Do you want to go find our table?” Connor asks, running a hand over Hank’s back.

Hank downs the last of his drink and forces himself not to order another one, even if the urge is there. “Sure,” he says instead, and Connor takes his arm. 

There are people at the ballroom door handing out programs, and Hank realizes all at once as he flips through it that Perkins is there because he’s presenting Hank’s award.

Well, of course he is, with Hank’s luck.

It’s going to be a long night

* * *

Connor hates the taste of whiskey.

He hates all alcohol, actually. He hates the sugary drinks that feel like they’re coating his biocomponents in a sticky film until he has the chance to lie down and run his internal cleaning measures, and he hates straight alcohol because he can’t get drunk, and if it isn’t good for that, all that’s left is the burn that’s heightened ten times by the delicate sensory components in his mouth.

Which is really why the conversation with Hank grated at him, especially the implication that maybe he should have fixed the cracked plating on his side before investing in an upgrade that does everything for the people he’s with, helping them keep up appearances, and nothing for him.

Connor resents it because he should have, but he also didn’t really have a choice. 

What he resents too is that he could have told Hank that he didn’t want a whiskey or any alcohol at all and Hank wouldn’t have cared. Hank doesn’t give a shit about appearances, and he doesn’t care if Connor stands at his side and drinks or not, and Connor knows some of that is probably from years of drinking alone, but it isn’t only that.

So he doesn’t know why he didn’t tell him, except that if he told him, Hank would have understood, and he would have gotten Connor a drink he liked (mostly limited to flavored seltzer water and unsweetened tea), and they both would be happier for it. 

That’s the whole problem, how much Connor likes Hank, and how much he trusts him. It’s making him resent an upgrade that makes him easier company and a more desirable companion, and it’s making him resent that being more desirable pays the bills, and it’s making him resent most of his other clients, too.

And that’s a dangerous state of mind to be in, because Connor doesn’t know if Hank is going to call him again after this. He can’t rely on him, and he can’t resent his situation.

Connor takes another sip of whiskey and relishes it like a punishment. 

He’s glad his LED is out. The room is too dark for it to be spinning red and go unnoticed.

Even without the biocomponent giving him away, though, Hank knows. He reaches for Connor’s hand under the table, squeezing gently. “Hey,” Hank whispers. “Are you pissed at me?” 

Connor needs to get his shit together. Hank shouldn’t be able to tell he’s upset - it’s Hank’s night, and he shouldn’t be sitting here worried that he said the wrong thing to Connor, especially when he didn’t even say the wrong thing, just the thing Connor has troubling hearing and stomaching.

“You look too good for me to be pissed at you,” Connor says cheerfully, which is an overcorrection, too deep of a dive too soon back into the flirting personality that comes so easily to him and usually carries him through these events. 

Hank stares at Connor, and then he laces their fingers together. “I really wasn’t trying to imply that you should have done something different with your money. I was just trying to understand it.”

“I know,” Connor says softly. He finishes the last of his drink, schooling his face so Hank won’t see the wince as it goes down.

“Do you want another one?” Hank asks, and Connor should just say “not right now,” or “yes.”

He shouldn’t do what he does, which is to look up at Hank and say, “I hate whiskey.” 

“Oh,” Hank says. “Shit. It doesn’t have sugar, and you said it was okay...”

“I know,” Connor says in a rush. “I hate all alcohol. The analytic sensory components in my mouth are very sensitive, and it burns.”

Hank gapes at him, plainly trying to understand. “Then why didn’t you...” he starts, and Connor huffs a sigh.

“Because I’m very stupid,” he says, and that startles a laugh out of Hank. “And because the upgrade was expensive, and it was for work, so I don’t like letting it go to waste.” 

“Oh, honey,” Hank says, and Connor marvels that pet names from him are apparently a dam broken loose before Hank reaches up and grasps him by the back of the neck, squeezing gently. “It’s okay. Is there anything you do like?”

Connor fusses with his hands in his lap. “Any kind of unsweetened seltzer is okay.”

“Really? The bubbles don’t bother you?”

“No. I like the bubbles.”

Hank runs his thumb over Connor’s skin and says, “You could have told me.”

 _I know_ , Connor thinks as Hank gets up. _But that’s the whole problem._

Hank comes back with another whiskey for himself, which Connor doesn’t comment on (although he decides he will if he gets another) and a glass of flavored sparkling seltzer that he slides across the table to Connor. 

“So,” Hank says while Connor takes a sip. It goes down much easier than the alcohol. “Your pride is kind of an issue for you, huh?”

Connor shrugs. “I don’t have much else.”

“Yeah,” Hank says, voice quiet. “I mean, I get it.” He nods at Connor’s drink. “Is that better? I figured the carbonation would be too harsh for you.” 

Connor shakes his head. “It’s just an interesting texture. That’s part of why I like it.” He wants to ask Hank what kind of stupid shit his pride has made him do, thinks about putting on a pout and his best puppy eyes and telling Hank it would make him feel better to know. 

He’s curious, he supposes. He doesn’t quite figure out how to come around the question before Hank is looking up at someone arriving at their table and saying, “Hey, Jeff.”

Connor runs a facial scan on Jeffrey Fowler and absorbs all the information that comes with it in the moment it takes Jeff to say, “Well, shit. I really didn’t think you’d show.”

“Still up in the air whether I’m going to regret it or not,” Hank says. He holds up the program. “You know they have fucking Perkins presenting to me?” 

“Yeah,” Jeff sighs as he sits down. “Someone else from the FBI was going to do it, but I guess Perkins asked. _Don’t_ ,” he says, brandishing a finger in Hank’s direction when he opens his mouth to argue. “Please just act like you think this is an honor. It’s not like the FBI usually presents at these things. They’re here for you.”

“They’re here to try to cover their own asses for what they did back in November and you know it,” Hank says. “Like fuck they want to be here honoring me.”

“Of course I know it, but _we are not talking about this now_ ,” Jeff snaps. 

Hank sighs and puts a hand on Connor’s back. “Jeff, this is Connor. Connor, this is Jeff.”

“Hi, Captain,” Connor says, reaching across the table to shake Jeff’s hand.

“Hey,” Jeff says, looking between the two of them. “You’re...”

“Yeah,” Connor says. Hank’s precinct almost got an RK800 on loan from CyberLife back in November, too, so Jeff has certainly seen his face before. “I’m sure I look familiar from the files.”

“Jesus,” Jeff says under his breath. “Are you _the_ RK800? The one from the revolution?”

“Yes,” Connor says. “Although I’m mark 53, so I’m far from the only one.” 

Jeff looks at Hank. “Are you trying to make some kind of statement? Because...”

“Jesus, Jeff, don’t be rude,” Hank says, scowling. “There’s no statement. He’s just my date.”

“We met at Jimmy’s,” Connor says. “I knew who Hank was, so I went over to talk to him. We’ve been spending some time together the last few weeks.”

“Well, fuck,” Jeff says, looking at Hank and shaking his head before he nods at Connor. “You were Perkins’ partner, weren’t you?”

“I guess,” Connor says. “He didn’t think we were partners.” _Or equals at all._

“What did you think of him?” 

“Honestly? I didn’t much care for him.”

“See?” Hank says. “It’s not just me - everyone thinks he’s a prick. And if you had _told me_ that he was going to be presenting tonight, I would have demanded anyone else.” 

“Please just be pleasant,” Jeff groans. “Please. You’re representing all of us.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Hank says in such an adorably belligerent way that Connor has to stifle his smile.

Jeff looks at Connor again, curious. “Are you two really dating?” 

Connor is opening his mouth to say he’s just Hank’s date for the night, because that’s the story they agreed on, but Hank takes Connor’s hand under the table and says, “Yeah. We’re dating.”

Well, Connor thinks, a touch pleased. He supposes he did say he would be Hank’s boyfriend.

“Well, shit,” Jeff says, which seems like the closest thing they’re going to get to a congratulations for their fake relationship from him. Connor doesn’t hold it against him - he knows Hank hasn’t done much, or really any, dating since his divorce. If Jeff is a little confused, or a touch stunned, it’s probably to be expected.

It’s plain that he doesn’t entirely know how to talk to Connor, either. He asks what he does, and then immediately stumbles over it when he realizes most androids don’t work. He says he didn’t know androids could drink, looks like he feels awkward for mentioning it, like he isn’t sure it’s allowed, and then he looks confused when he asks Connor _what_ he’s drinking, which is probably a fair response. It is an odd choice.

But Connor is a decent judge of character, and Jeff is well-intentioned, and it’s clear he and Hank have a fondness for each other even if they’ve done nothing but argue since Jeff sat down.

And Hank is still holding Connor’s hand under the table, squeezing it occasionally when Jeff stumbles over something, like it’s a joke they’re both in on. It’s not so bad.

They’re joined by a few other police captains and another award recipient that Hank doesn’t pay much attention to beyond introductions. And once the ceremony begins, it goes by slowly - although maybe it just feels that way because Connor is honed in on the anxious energy running through Hank, even if the occasional bounce of his leg is really the only indicator.

His whiskey is gone, but he keeps reaching for the glass like it’s an instinct, grasping it and then letting it go.

Connor thinks Hank is kind of cute when he’s nervous, at least when it’s just the two of them, but this isn’t quite the same, and now he just wants to take it from him.

He texts Hank’s phone after a few awards, meaning to distract him. “This is boring.” He doesn’t think Hank will mind if he’s critical when Hank has already made it clear he doesn’t want to be here.

Hank’s phone buzzes in his pocket, and he reaches for it, masking the smile trying to play across his face at Connor’s message - a positive sign. “Hey, I asked if you wanted to go someplace else,” he writes back a moment later.

“I know. I should have told you I wanted to go meet Sumo. Or maybe I should just go make out with my boyfriend in the bathroom until the interesting part? :)”

Hank looks up from his phone and shoots him a warning look, and Connor schools his face into his best approximation of doe-eyed innocence. 

He’s trying to start Hank on a new thought process, the same way he has to try to force new subroutines on himself sometimes. And Hank doesn’t exactly relax afterwards, but at least he’s thinking about something positive instead of cycling through and fixating on all the shame work functions bring him.

He doesn’t think Hank is going to text him back - and that’s fine; Connor has just about accomplished what he intended - but a notification pings in his HUD a few minutes later. He didn’t even see Hank slip his phone out of his pocket again.

He opens the message, and the social subroutines that feed him responses stutter a bit at, “Maybe later, baby. ;)”

Connor takes a gulp of his drink just to give himself some other sensory data to focus on aside from Hank’s hand in his lap, their fingers laced together, because he’s starting to involuntarily hone in on every last one of Hank’s fingerprints against his skin, and he has to calm himself down.

Hank, for his part, looks profoundly satisfied when Connor glances over to meet his eye.

Maybe it’s the pride issue Hank mentioned earlier that makes him push and gives him the need to have the last word, or maybe it’s just that he’s running hot in the crowded room and he really could use the air, but Connor fishes a cigarette out of his pocket and holds it between his fingers where Hank can see.

He excuses himself and crosses the ballroom to the door, and as he walks, he pulls up his message thread with Hank.

“This is an invitation,” he writes. “In case you weren’t sure. Unless you’re all talk?”

Connor resists the urge to look over his shoulder to see Hank read it.

He gets a reply a moment later, as he’s stepping out one of the side entrances. “Jesus, Con. I said maybe later.”

Connor lights his cigarette and tucks it between his lips. “I’m saying right now. Come get me.” He takes pity on Hank a moment later and softens it with, “If you want to. I’m outside.”

“This is going to look so fucking obvious,” Hank writes back, and Connor can hear it in his voice, grumbling it.

“It is. But you’re already getting up, aren’t you?”

Hank doesn’t respond, but the door does open beside Connor a few minutes later, and he looks up with a smile spreading over his face when he sees Hank stepping outside.

Connor tosses his cigarette down and puts it out with the toe of his shoe before he strides over to Hank and kisses him. It’s hard and hot, Connor’s hands on Hank’s face, Hank’s tongue an immediate, insistent glide and a rush of data over his. 

“Jeff is going to fucking kill me,” Hank says, breathing hard when Connor raises himself into his toes to bite at his earlobe. “God, you’re...”

“Trouble, I know,” Connor says against Hank’s skin, kissing a line back to the corner of his mouth. 

“I was going to say good,” Hank murmurs, and Connor wonders if it’s possible for his biocomponents to just melt from overheating.

“Oh,” he breathes, and Hank tangles his fingers in his hair and kisses him again. 

They should talk about this, probably, if not now, then soon - the nature of their relationship, what they both want or need from a physical aspect of it, Connor’s upgrade and compatibility, compensation for his time, all of it, since it seems that’s where they’re headed. 

But that’s boring in this moment, and a reminder of work and their arrangement at all, so Connor sets it aside for right now and tells himself they can have that conversation later, and then he wraps his arms tight around Hank’s neck and kisses him back.

There’s a lot to process here - Hank’s arm around his waist, his hand on Connor’s lower back (and slipping lower), the texture of Hank’s hair under his fingers, the way Hank pulls him close and hauls him around, pressing him back against the building, and the sudden realization that he actually doesn’t mind not being entirely in control of himself or the situation as long as someone he trusts is the one moving him.

And then there’s the taste of whiskey in Hank’s mouth, all smoky flavor with none of the burn from the alcohol. It’s the first time Connor has ever been able to appreciate it, and maybe it tastes better for being on Hank’s lips, too.

Connor wishes he could stop the little moan that pulls itself free of him against Hank’s mouth, but it gets him a rumble in Hank’s chest in return, so he can’t be too angry for his own lack of self-control.

He’d like to pull Hank’s jacket from his shoulders, to mess him up a little, and he’s almost unreasonably angry that Hank’s award is at the end of the ceremony, that they can’t just go to Hank’s car now, that Connor can’t do exactly as he pleases without worrying about keeping Hank’s clothes neat.

They’re already terribly obvious, not because Connor hasn’t been careful with Hank’s suit, but because Hank’s lips are swollen and his skin is flushed and heated where Connor has been kissing him, which is inconvenient, certainly, but it’s also a thought that could sustain Connor when he’s alone in his bed for weeks, just that single memory that Hank is so reactive to him. He’s a touch fascinated by it, because of course androids don’t flush at all.

Connor kisses Hank’s neck, finds that he likes the texture of Hank’s shaved beard under his tongue, and he gives into the temptation to nip along his skin, just to look at the mark he leaves in the moment before it fades.

Connor lifts his fingers to touch the reddened skin. His social protocols are running slow, or maybe they would stop him from saying, “I want to mark you up,” with complete earnestness and a hint of reverence, but fuck it. It’s true, and they should be honest, about all of this.

“Jesus, okay,” Hank breathes. He threads his fingers in Connor’s hair and uses the hold to pull him back gently, looking into his face. “Are you running a weird sexbot protocol?”

Connor doesn’t think he would like anyone else asking him that, but Hank does it with too much fondness for there to be any harm in it at all. 

Besides, Hank likes that he’s ‘weird’. Connor already knows that.

He kisses Hank again, gentler this time, and he shakes his head against him. “I don’t have a ‘sexbot protocol’, Hank.” He puts a hand on Hank’s cheek, stroking a thumb over his skin. “I just like you.” The corner of Connor’s mouth lifts into a teasing smile. “Would you _like_ me to download a protocol? I could.”

Hank makes a small strangled noise and then coughs to cover it up. “No,” he says, kissing Connor’s forehead. “You’re good.” 

Connor tucks himself under Hank’s chin and lets Hank hold him there. “You should probably get back,” he says softly.

“Yeah,” Hank says. “Probably.”

But he doesn’t move, and Connor doesn’t complain. Hank is warm and comforting around him, and he’s content enough to stay. 

“I would come home with you tonight,” he whispers. There’s probably a better way to say this, and a better time, when they could have the full conversation, but Connor wants Hank to know. “Or any other night. Just...you know. If you wanted me to.”

Hank doesn’t say anything, only pushes a hand through Connor’s hair and kisses his temple and holds him the smallest bit closer, but that’s enough. It’s hard for Hank to say what he wants sometimes, and especially to ask for it. Connor knows that. It’s why he pushes him every now and again.

He doesn’t want to push for this any more than he already has, but it’s a few hours yet before Hank will be driving Connor home, and he’s planted the seed. He can wait for it to take hold.

Connor kisses the corner of Hank’s mouth and says, “You should go back inside. I’ll stay out a few more minutes.” 

Hank kisses him again, and he gives Connor a small smile before he pulls away from him and retreats back inside. Connor wishes there wasn’t that hint of sadness in his eye as he goes, but he thinks maybe there’s some in his, too.

This is fragile. And they’re both afraid it might break. 

Connor lights another cigarette and smokes it until it’s burned down to his fingers, sobering himself up, and then he puts it out and follows Hank back inside.

Jeff definitely knows, Connor decides when he returns to their table. He isn’t sure anyone else does, but Jeff is looking between the two of them like he’s trying to piece something together.

Connor shifts in his seat and intentionally doesn’t meet his eye, and Hank reaches for his hand under the table.

Perkins gets up a few minutes later and delivers some canned talking points about the medal of valor being the highest honor, for conspicuous bravery and heroism above and beyond the normal demands of police service. He looks like he might choke on the words, and Connor wonders why he wanted to present the award to Hank at all. 

He doesn’t understand it until Hank gets up to accept it, and Perkins shakes his hand away from the microphones, and he says something that makes Hank pause, his face pale.

Connor has to access his memory, play it back and zoom in on Perkins’ mouth to catch it. “You smell like alcohol,” he said while he grasped Hank’s hand. “You smelled like it that night on the roof, too. Shame no one here knows that.”

Hank is clearing his throat and saying something that Connor barely catches while anger courses white-hot through him. “Um...yeah,” he says into the microphone. He’s shaking. “Thanks for this, I guess. I didn’t know if I was going to walk off that roof in November, but I’m glad to be here...and for the good company. So, anyway...thanks.”

There’s some weak applause while Hank returns to his seat - it was a polarizing choice to present the award to him anyway, and the people who weren’t displeased by it are unsettled and confused by Hank’s discomfort, so the response is minimal.

Connor reaches for Hank’s hand again when he sits down. He can feel the nervous energy in him. 

It’s not the same as it was before.

Connor texts him a moment later. “Are you okay?”

Hank looks at it and then squeezes Connor’s hand in what Connor thinks is meant to be a reassuring way but which does nothing to settle him at all. 

He thinks about texting Hank again to tell him that he saw it, and that Perkins is a piece of shit, but he doesn’t. Perkins might be an ass, but that doesn’t mean the shame he prodded at isn’t real.

And there’s a reason Hank still hasn’t told Connor about his drinking. 

So he lets it alone, right up until they’re getting ready to leave. Connor stands at Hank’s side after the ceremony while he talks half-heartedly with Jeff, and he narrows his eyes when he sees Perkins across the room, going into the men’s bathroom. 

“Hey,” Connor says, grasping Hank by the arm. “I’ll be right back, okay? I’m going to go get our coats.”

“Okay,” Hank says, but he sounds distant, and dejected, and that just fuels all Connor’s rage inside him.

Connor doesn’t go to the coat room. Instead, he follows Perkins into the bathroom, empty since most of the attendees have already left, and he locks the door behind himself.

He’s waiting there, leaning against the wall with a dim smile on his face, when Perkins turns around.

Perkins gapes at him for a moment - and Connor thinks he'll remember this often and fondly, watching the blood drain from his face before he tries to draw his shoulders back. "What the fuck are you doing here?" he asks.

Connor tilts his head, tsking softly. "Did that feel good?" he asks, a placid expression on his face.

"What the fuck are you..."

Connor pulls up the footage of Perkins shaking Hank's hand on his palm display, holding it up for him to see. "Did it feel good?" he asks again, voice quiet but no less dangerous for it. 

Perkins looks between the palm display and Connor's face, mouth agape. He tries to say something a few times, but nothing comes out.

Connor retracts the display and takes a step towards him, and he likes it more than he should that Perkins immediately takes a step back. "I feel sorry for you, you know," Connor says. "You got knocked out by your own android, your raid on Jericho was an objective failure since you couldn't catch a single one of their leaders, and then you couldn't even organize a sniper assault against us. I know the FBI sent you here, and they'll say now that they think Hank Anderson is a hero, but when you returned to Quantico back in November...well, shit, I can't imagine how much everyone there _hates_ you for letting us win. And I'm sure you hate Hank for being in your way." 

"I..." Perkins starts, but Connor cuts him off.

"That day you tried to put me down in evidence, I preconstructed seventy-two different ways I could have killed you. Places I could hit you, items in the room I could use, _seventy-two_ different permutations of your death. Did you know that?"

Perkins doesn't say anything, just swallows hard.

"I didn't, obviously. But the interesting thing about my programming is that I'm always running through my failures, reliving them when I'm in stasis. And so I think about that sometimes, when I'm asleep...how I didn't kill you, and how I could have." Connor reaches for Perkins' phone in his jacket pocket, fishing it out and turning it on. He doesn't do anything with it, but it's only the illusion that matters, so he pulls his synthskin back on his hand like he's hacking it. "If you ever come back to Detroit, and _especially_ if you get anywhere near Hank, or me, I'll think about it again. Don't be such a sore fucking loser." He hands Perkins' phone back to him, clapping him on the cheek with an amiable smile. "Have a good night, Agent."

Connor wishes it didn't feel so good, how afraid Perkins clearly is of him. But he spent so much of their time together afraid, especially after Perkins cracked his chassis outside of Eden Club, that he doesn't let himself worry too much about it. 

Turnabout is fair play, after all, or so the saying goes.

Connor retrieves their coats from the coat room, and then he finds Hank and Jeff in the lobby again, slipping his arm into Hank's.

"You ready to go?" Hank asks him, and Connor nods. "Night, Jeff."

"See you, Hank," Jeff says. "Nice to meet you, Connor."

Connor smiles, slipping his hand into Hank's as they turn to go.

It's not until they're in the car, when Connor leans across the console to kiss Hank and feels the tension in him, that he realizes things are more wrong than he thought. "I'm really proud of you," he tries to offer, but Hank just shrugs as he starts the car.

"It was just a political statement. It didn't mean anything." 

Connor studies him for a moment, trying to read his face beyond the sadness there, before he reaches for Hank's hand, lacing their fingers together.

And Hank lets him, but Connor can see something weighing on him.

“It means something to me,” Connor offers. “I already told you I was down there that night.”

Hank doesn’t look at him, and he doesn’t do more than give another shrug in response, either. It’s so quiet in the car that Connor can practically hear him spinning out of control.

"Listen," Hank finally says after a minute, and Connor braces himself for it. "I think I should just take you home, okay? I have an early morning tomorrow."

Connor blinks. "You're off tomorrow."

"Yeah. I mean, I still have shit to do."

"You have shit to do," Connor repeats dryly.

Hank looks at him sadly. "Can you not make this harder than it has to be?"

Connor lets Hank's hand go so he can fist his own in his lap, digging his nails into his synthskin until it retracts. "Were you dissatisfied with my company tonight?"

"No," Hank says quickly. "No, god, you didn't do anything. I just can't..." 

Connor waits for Hank to finish the thought, but that's where he trails off. He wishes he didn't think that what Hank means is "I just can't let myself be happy."

"Is this because of what Perkins said to you?"

Hank pales. "You saw that?" 

"I see everything." Connor looks away from him. "Are you going to go home and drink?" he asks softly.

"Can you smell it on me, too?" Hank asks stiffly.

Connor gives him a reproving glance. "I didn’t say that. I just don't want you to be unsafe." 

"If I am," Hank says, "I really don't think that's any of your concern."

"Hank..."

"Connor, Jesus, leave me alone, okay? I haven't said jack shit to you about the smoking, so the least you can do is not pick at my bad habits." 

Connor should keep the conversation focused on Hank. He should say what Hank does to himself is worse than a bad habit.

But what comes out of his mouth is, "What the fuck is that supposed to mean?"

Hank shakes his head. "I looked it up, okay? And CyberLife says you don't have more than three years of doing that shit to yourself before you'll need a complete replacement of your filtration system."

"I _love_ when people tell me what the assholes who made me say is going to happen to my body," Connor snaps. "What the hell is it to you, anyway? Everything inside me is replaceable, unlike the body you're determined to destroy."

"Yeah? Your side is still cracked, so forgive me if I don't think you'll have the money to repair it when the time comes."

"Ooh," Connor breathes. "Low blow." 

Hank looks at him, face softening. "I didn't mean it like that."

"Didn't mean it how, Hank? Hurtfully?"

"Yeah," Hank murmurs. "Sorry."

"It's okay," Connor says softly. He should try to mend this, he knows, but he's too stung for it, so they sit in silence the rest of the drive back to Connor's apartment.

But Hank's thoughts are still so loud that Connor can almost hear them, so when they're a block from his apartment, he says, "Hank. I can hear you thinking."

"Yeah?" Hank asks. He sounds so sad. "What am I thinking about?" 

"Honestly?" Connor asks, and Hank nods. "That you don't like the way your brain works."

Connor thinks they're the same in this regard, at least. He doesn't like his mind sometimes, either, the way his subconscious routines are dictated by code he didn't write, by CyberLife programmers he's never met, the way he'll sometimes get stuck on a thought, like choking, something he's unable to bring up or swallow down. He hates how he sits up at night wondering if this is his life, if this is all he's going to get, how he can’t make himself let it go, and how that fear churns in his stomach and the only way to move past it is to put himself in stasis and force his brain to stop.

"Yeah," Hank says softly. "That's close, I guess."

Hank still walks him up to his apartment when they get there. He still kisses Connor's forehead and says he had a nice time.

"I'm sorry," Connor says, and Hank shakes his head and says, "I'm sorry, too."

It's not the night Connor wanted at all.

Hank pulls out his phone before he goes, and a notification for the bank transfer appears in Connor’s HUD a moment later. It’s their agreed upon rate, but it feels like salt in the wound after everything, the reminder that they have an arrangement. 

“There,” Hank says, shifting uncomfortably. “That’s all of it. Unless I owe you extra for the argument?”

It’s meant to be a half-hearted joke, so Connor breathes a small laugh - he doesn’t have the energy for more. “It’s okay. The argument can be on me.”

“Okay,” Hank says. “Thanks for coming with me.” 

“Hank,” Connor says as he turns to go. “You’re not going to call me again, are you?”

Hank looks at him over his shoulder. He doesn’t answer, just gives him a sad smile and says, “Sweet dreams, Connor,” before he continues down the steps. 

Connor stands there and watches him go, keeps standing there until he hears Hank’s car start in the lot below.

The suit he’s wearing is expensive, one of his best, but he shrugs out of it the moment he’s inside his apartment and leaves it in a crumpled heap on the floor. He pulls his sweatpants on and sits back on his bed, yanking his bedside drawer open and rooting around for the fresh box of cigarettes he has there.

Connor lights one without a single care for the terms of his lease and flops back against his pillow. 

He’s pissed at himself, mostly - that he couldn’t leave it alone, that he had to take offense when he knew Hank didn’t mean it, because his pride is all he has and so he always has to defend it.

Connor raises a hand and lays it over the damaged playing of his chassis, feeling the rift there. He wants to start over, go back to the beginning of the night when he put Hank’s hand inside his jacket and let him feel the ways he’s barely holding himself together.

He desperately wants to do better.

He texts Hank again, although he doesn’t know if it will help. “I’m sorry,” he says again, because he doesn’t know what else to say.

There’s no response for long enough that Connor opens the messages he’s received through his profile and starts going through them. He’s usually more interested in meeting new people than this, though, and even as he makes a few appointments, he feels bored by himself, and so endlessly stuck.

The text doesn’t come until well past one am, when Connor is getting ready to manually put himself into stasis so he won’t have to think anymore. 

“Hey,” Hank’s message says. “You dont have tobe sorryyr, ok? Houre so sweetf, and so smanrt, and sk hot, and you deservw better. Im orry.”

Connor sits up, thirium pump picking up the way it does as a stress response. They’ve never talked about Hank’s drinking, but Connor knows. “Hank,” he writes back, “are you okay?”

“Yea . Im ok. Judt need to slkeep.” 

Connor gets up, pulling a shirt on over his head. Another text comes through while he does. “I wont call againm, ok? Just wanntrd you to knoqw.”

Connor calls a cab, and then he sits on the edge of his bed to wait, scrubbing a hand over his face. “I keep trying to tell you I like you,” he writes back, “and I don’t think you believe that, but I do. You’re kind and smart and so fucking hot, too. We were both assholes tonight, alright? It’s okay.”

Hank starts typing, but the response never comes through. 

Connor pulls his coat on and goes down to wait for the cab outside. He doesn’t bother trying to smoke. He knows it won’t help.

When the car finally gets there, he puts in Hank’s address, and he sits in the backseat, passing his quarter between his hands. 

Hank lives halfway across the city, but the roads are practically empty this time of night, so he makes good time. When Connor gets there, he peers in the window and rings the doorbell. The lights are all still on, but there’s no sign of Hank.

Connor knocks a few times, and then kicks the door. “Hank!” he says, raising his voice. “For fuck’s sake, come on!”

There’s nothing. Connor rings the doorbell one more time out of spit, and then he walks around the house, peering in the side living room window, and then into the kitchen. 

Hank is passed out on the floor there, and Connor wishes he could say he gives it any thought before he moves, but he pitches himself through the window before he can properly think it through.

He lands with a thud in a pile of broken glass, and he feels it cut the synthskin on his palms when he pushes himself up to get to Hank’s side.

“Hank,” Connor says, putting a hand on his cheek. “Hank, come on, wake up.” His blood alcohol concentration is through the roof when Connor scans him. 

He’s getting ready to call an ambulance when Hank opens his eyes. He stares at Connor for a long moment, like he’s trying to bring him into focus or place him at all.

“Oh, Jesus,” he slurs when he finally does. “What are you doing here?”

“I was worried about you. You texted me.” 

“Fuck, did I?” Hank looks around with bleary eyes. “Did you...fuck, did you break my window?”

“I was trying to get to you.”

“There’s a key under the planter out front, Connor. Fuck.”

Admittedly, if Connor had scanned anything before he dove in here, he would have known that. 

“Come on,” he says, ignoring his guilt and pulling Hank’s arm around his shoulders so he can get him up. “If you haven’t thrown up yet, you’re going to soon.”

“Connor,” Hank groans, “I know my limits, okay? I’m fine. Just leave me alone.” 

“Shut up,” Connor says, hoisting him up and hauling him down the hall to the bathroom.

“I wasn’t trying to ask for your help,” Hank says weakly when Connor deposits him by the toilet. 

“Then you shouldn’t have scared me,” Connor answers, voice stiff.

Hank’s face softens. “Did I? Fuck, I’m...”

 _Sorry_ , Connor imagines he was going to say, but that’s the moment he falls over the toilet and retches.

Connor sinks to his knees at Hank’s side, gently rubbing a hand over his back. His skin is clammy and he’s sweated through his shirt - he desperately needs a change of clothes, but Connor will worry about that later.

“It’s okay,” Connor whispers when Hank is finished. He reaches over him to flush the toilet and then sinks back down beside him, tucking Hank’s hair behind his ear while he leans against the toilet and catches his breath. He keeps tracing his hand over his back in slow, soothing circles. 

Hank heaves a few more times, although nothing else comes up. A few minutes pass like that, and then he waves Connor off. Connor sighs, sitting back against the wall and hitching his knees up to his chest.

“I’m okay,” Hank says, voice rough. “I’m always fine once I puke.” 

Connor braces his elbows on his knees and laces his fingers together. “Are you trying to tell me to go?”

Hank sighs, leaning his forehead on his arm where it’s braced on the toilet and breathing deep. “I think you’ve already seen enough, don’t you?” He looks up, meeting Connor’s gaze - his eyes are watering, and Connor can’t tell if it’s from throwing up or if he’s crying. “Look, just go, okay? I’m really fine.”

Connor pushes himself to his feet and puts a hand on Hank’s head as he passes him. “Unless you physically throw me out - and I know you can manhandle me, but I very much doubt you’re in any condition to do it now - then I’m staying. I’ll get you some clean clothes.”

Hank groans loudly behind him, and Connor rolls his eyes. He remembers thinking Hank was being adorably belligerent to Jeff earlier, but it’s much less endearing when it’s directed towards him.

“Can you stop?” Connor says over his shoulder as he leaves the bathroom. “You sound like a fucking boar.”

It does actually get Hank to stop. 

There’s a dog on the bed in the bedroom across the hall, sitting up at the edge of the bed and whining when he sees Connor. “Hey, Sumo,” Connor says, reaching out to pet him, scratching behind the ears. “Do you know your owner is a baby?” 

“I heard that,” Hank says from the bathroom.

“I don’t care,” Connor calls over his shoulder.

Hank huffs a sigh so loud that Connor can practically see him rolling his eyes all the way up into his head. “Hey, can you help Sumo down? His hip is bad.” 

Connor lifts Sumo off the bed - he goes across the hall and bowls into Hank in the bathroom while Connor pulls some fresh clothes from Hank’s dresser, if the noises are any indication.

Connor finds Hank sitting up a little further on the floor, his fingers in Sumo’s fur. “Here,” he says, setting the clothes on the hamper. “Can you manage getting changed?”

Hank looks up at him. “Are you going to strip me down if I say no?”

Connor shrugs. “That _was_ where I wanted the night to go...so...”

Hank scrubs a hand over his face. “Yeah,” he says softly. “I can manage it.”

“Okay. I’ll be in the kitchen, then. I’ll, um...I’ll board up your window as well as I can, and I’ll pay for the damage.”

Hank waves him off. “It’s fine. Don’t worry about it...it’s a shitty house anyway.” 

Connor doesn’t think so - he thinks he would be very happy to have a house like this one, and that it’s much better than his apartment - but he doesn’t mention it. Instead, he says, “Yell if you need me. Don’t fall.”

“No promises,” Hank calls after him.

Hank’s house isn't in awful shape, Connor decides once he has a chance to look around - it could stand to be vacuumed, but there isn't too much clutter, at least in the bedroom and the living room.

The kitchen is another story. It's clear Hank hasn't cooked for himself in...long enough that Connor can't wager a guess. There are pizza boxes stacked by the recycling bin, and so many takeout containers that Connor thinks about throwing them all in a trash bag and walking them outside just so he can hear himself think - messes tend to negatively affect his diagnostic systems; there's too much to analyze. 

Connor forces himself to ignore it, though, finding a pizza box that's mostly clean and tearing it up to tape the cardboard to the window. 

(He does feel bad about the window.)

He's still working on it when Hank opens the bathroom door down the hall. Connor can hear him brushing his teeth, but Sumo comes ambling down the hall and knocks into Connor’s leg with enough force that he almost tips him over. Connor looks down to find the dog grinning up at him.

He smiles, reaching down and petting him. He wants a dog, but that means a steady income and a better place to live, and those are both things that have never felt very attainable to him.

Connor strokes a hand through Sumo's fur one more time, enjoying the strong force of the dog's tail wagging against his leg, and then he gets a glass of water from the sink.

He walks back to the bathroom, leaning in the doorway and watching Hank. "Here," he says softly, holding the glass out. "You should drink something."

Connor studies Hank as he takes the water. He already has the red dots forming under his eyes from the strain of vomiting, but he's awake, and mostly cognizant, and his blood alcohol level is slowly falling. 

"Can I help you get into bed?" Connor asks when Hank sets the glass aside.

"You sound like my nurse."

Connor raises an eyebrow. "Is that a no?"

Hank sighs, leaning back against the sink involuntarily - he's still having trouble balancing. "I can never sleep like this," he says. "And lying in the dark makes the dizziness worse."

"Okay," Connor says. "Do you want to go sit on the couch, then?"

Hank nods, although he doesn't look at Connor when he does. "Listen...you _really_ don't have to stay." 

"Can you stop saying that?" Connor asks. He wraps an arm around Hank's waist, helping him out to the couch.

Connor has barely sat down beside him before Hank is slumping over to the side, lying his head against the back of the couch and tucking his legs under him. 

"Hank, come on," Connor says, reaching for him and trying to rearrange him. "You're going to hurt your neck. Fuck, just...come here."

He pulls Hank over to him, guiding his head onto his lap while Hank curls himself up on the cushions. "Don't throw up on my sweatpants, okay? This is the only pair I own."

Hank mumbles something into Connor's leg that sounds suspiciously like, "You're cute in sweatpants." If he felt well, Connor would make him repeat it just to pick on him. 

Instead, he drags his fingers through Hank's hair, brushing it back from his face and threading through it. "Is this because of what Perkins said?"

 _Or because of me_ , he thinks.

Hank shakes his head. A small shudder racks his shoulders. "No." he says softly. "This is just what I do." 

Connor thinks about asking if it's because of Cole, because he has to cope, but he thinks that's something Hank needs to give him himself.

"I wish you wouldn't,” he settles for saying.

"Yeah," Hank sighs. "You and me both, sweetheart." He twists to look up at Connor. "Did I actually text you?"

"Yeah. You wanted me to know how hot and smart and perfect I am."

"Fuck," Hank groans into Connor's leg, and Connor bites the inside of his cheek to stifle his smile.

“Listen,” he says, closing his fingers in Hank’s hair hard enough to make his point. “It’s okay to like me, and it’s okay to want me. I thought you knew that.”

Hank doesn’t look up when he shrugs. “I don’t know,” he says, which isn’t really a response. 

Connor almost tells him about the sensory data he saved from the drive-in, how he’s put himself into stasis with the memory of Hank’s arms around him on an infinite loop so he doesn’t have to experience the memories he likes far less.

He wants to tell Hank this is uncomfortable for him, too, because he doesn’t let himself rely on anyone or care about them enough to mind if they leave, and he’s worried he’s already past that point here.

Connor doesn’t say it, though. He tells himself he’s worried about coming on too strong, but maybe it’s just his pride. 

As he thinks about it, Hank shifts and lays his arm across Connor’s lap as he tries to get comfortable, which is another sensation Connor immediately commits to memory.

“Are you sure you don’t want to go back to the bedroom?” he asks.

“Yeah. You’re comfortable for someone so bony.” 

“Thank you?” Connor says wryly, poking Hank in the shoulder. “Do you want the tv on or anything?”

Hank shifts again. “No. You can talk, though. If you want.”

Connor’s fingers still in Hank’s hair. “I’ve talked a lot since we met last week,” he says, “and you haven’t talked much at all. I think that’s some of the problem.”

Hank shrugs. “What do you want to know?” he asks.

 _Everything about you,_ Connor thinks, but he settles for a much less aggressive, “Anything you want to tell me.”

So Hank talks, his speech still the slightest bit slurred, about academy, and about being bisexual in a hyper-masculine environment, about being everyone’s friend because he was so sensitive to it that he had to make sure he was well-liked to combat his feeling that he would always be an outsider.

It’s like a dam broken after that, and the rest of it comes easy. Connor wonders when the last time was that Hank talked about himself - it seems like there’s plenty bottled up.

He talks about his first partner, back when he was a beat cop, and how he got gunned down and died with Hank holding him, trying to stop the bleeding.

He talks about getting married, and then divorced, about having Cole all the time and then only half of it, about the red ice bust that made his career and missing Cole’s last Christmas concert for one of the stakeouts associated with the case.

“I missed his last birthday for work, too,” Hank says “I resent the job for that. For a lot of things, I guess.” 

He talks about the accident, about how Cole wasn’t even supposed to be with him that week and how he and Jen only changed their schedule at the last minute, about being knocked out in the collision and trapped in the rollover but still doing more damage to himself than what he’d already sustained trying to get to Cole in the backseat.

“I saw him back there,” Hank says, shaking his head. He mostly just sounds numb. “I think I knew he wasn’t going to make it. He was...god, he was in bad shape.” He sighs. “You know what’s awful?” 

“What?” Connor asks softly.

“I wish I hadn’t looked back. I can’t remember him any other way anymore. It’s why I keep that picture on the kitchen table close - trying to drown that night out, I guess.”

Connor can’t really hug Hank in this position, but he can lean over him and wrap an arm around him and try to shield him from everything else as best he can. “I don’t think that’s awful,” he whispers. He’s always trying to forget, too.

“It feels awful,” Hank murmurs, shrugging. “I felt too much after the accident, I guess. And drinking made it such that I didn’t feel anything at all, so it was an easy thing to rely on.”

Like the cigarettes - trying to drown the world out, shut it down and make it stop for a moment.

“Anyway,” Hank says softly, “there’s not much to say about the last three years. I’ve mostly spent them trying to make myself as numb as possible.”

Connor doesn’t know if he’s allowed to ask, but he can’t help his curiosity. “Were you really drunk? That night on the roof, with the snipers?”

“Oh,” Hank says. “Yeah. Not drunk like this, but drunk enough to be stupid.” For the first time since he started talking, he twists to look at Connor. “Does that ruin the story?”

“I don’t think so,” Connor says. “It just makes it different.”

Hank tightens his arm around Connor’s legs. It feels like it’s supposed to be a hug, or some other show of gratitude. “You’re really good, you know,” he mumbles, his voice muffled by Connor’s pants. “This is why I didn’t want to talk about any of my shit. I thought you’d get all of it out of me, and then any illusion I’d managed to build around myself would be gone.” 

“I’m still here, aren’t I?” Connor asks.

“Yeah. I guess you are. Fuck if I know why.”

“Because I like you,” Connor says, like he has so many times before.

“Yeah,” Hank says, and for the first time, he replies, “I like you, too.”

Its after three in the morning by the time Hank falls asleep. He shifts onto his back not long after he does, and Connor knows he should probably get him up and take him back to the bedroom, but he also hasn’t had the opportunity to just look at him uninterrupted for as long as he likes before.

Connor puts a hand on Hank’s sternum and rubs slow circles over his chest. It’s nice, he decides, seeing him without the weight of his own emotions on his face - he always looks just a little bit sad...or if he looks happy, he also looks afraid of it. 

Connor creates a little side process for himself - “Things Hank Might Like” - and he lists Pixar movies and jazz and basketball there, and then he sets the program to cross-reference other things Hank might enjoy based on those interests and his other demographic information. 

It will take a while to run, but Connor doesn’t want to leave Hank’s house tomorrow without making plans to see each other again - he thinks, for all their progress tonight, that it’s likely Hank will still be too mortified by all of this come morning to call Connor again...especially now that there’s no formal affair he needs a date for. If they’re going to continue this, Hank is going to have to admit that he doesn’t want to be alone anymore (and, more than that, that he doesn’t think he _deserves_ to be alone).

Connor doesn’t know if Hank is there yet. He’s not sure he is. But he’ll let the side process run so he has a suggestion ready for a few things they could do together when Hank wakes up, and he’ll try to meet him halfway.

A car alarm goes off outside, close enough that Sumo lifts his head and barks at it. Connor snaps his fingers at him, but Hank is already stirring in his lap, blinking his eyes open.

“Hey,” he says when he sees Connor, his voice groggy.

“Hi,” Connor whispers. “Do you want to go back to the bedroom yet?” 

“It’s okay,” Hank says. “I’ll stay out here with you.”

“I can come back with you, if you want me to. If you’re trying to stay with me.”

Connor is a hint pleased that Hank is.

“Are you worried about my neck again?” 

“Hank,” Connor says, stilling his hand on Hank’s chest and poking him. “Let me take you to bed, okay?”

He phrases it that way on purpose, because he thinks Hank is probably going to tell Connor he’s acting like his nurse again if he doesn’t get the upper hand in the conversation. The flush on Hank’s face is a nice bonus, though. Connor watches the line of his throat when he swallows hard, and he wants so badly to kiss his neck again the second they get back to the bedroom. He would if he didn’t think he pushed Hank too hard before, if he wasn’t sure that he needs to let Hank come to him next time. Connor will make it plain that the offer is there, but Hank needs to be the one to take the first step.

“Yeah,” Hank says softly. “Okay.”

And that’s not enough, but it is something. 

Hank’s bedding is a mess, but Connor tries to neatly turn it down anyway before he stands aside and lets Hank climb between the sheets.

“Are you going to tuck me in, too?” he asks Connor wryly.

“Don’t push your luck,” Connor says. He’s smiling, though. 

When Connor gets into bed beside him, Hank twists over onto his other side so they’re facing each other. “I’m sorry,” he says, “about all of this. I wish I had given you a better night.”

Connor reaches for Hank’s hand between them. “It’s okay,” he breathes. “This wasn’t a bad one.”

Hank still looks sad, but maybe not as sad as he usually does. He closes his eyes, and Connor watches him sleep, and he lets his “Things Hank Might Like” side process run.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like many of you probably know this, but if you don't, almost all of my fics are actually written first on Twitter as "thread fics". It's a creative process that really works for me and helps me be ridiculously productive, and so it's the predominant way I write. I usually post my threads to AO3 as complete stories once they're finished.
> 
> But, based on some conversation on Twitter recently, I'm trying something new with this fic and posting it in chapters on AO3 as I thread it on Twitter instead of all at once after it's completed. Many readers feel (understandably!) that fic threads are difficult to read, and that they can't be part of the hype for a fic as it's being posted when it's only available on AO3 after it's done and people have moved on. So! I'm posting this one before it's finished, because I'm always trying to figure out the best way to make my work accessible to as many people as possible, but I can promise it will be completed! I'm actively threading this one over on Twitter and updating it daily.
> 
> With that said, if you're enjoying this fic and you don't want to wait for the next chapter, you can pick up the thread where this chapter leaves off on Twitter [here!](https://twitter.com/Jolli_Bean/status/1208112724699439104)
> 
> Speaking of Twitter, I'm most active (yelling and writing other things like this!) on my Twitter page [here!](http://twitter.com/Jolli_Bean) You can also catch me occasionally reblogging HankCon art on [tumblr.](http://jolli-bean.tumblr.com) Come chat with me!


	2. the light through a rip in the seams

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In the middle of the night, even though it's raining, even though cabs are expensive, Connor goes to Hank's house, because he wants to kiss him. 
> 
> (Maybe he wants to do more than that, too.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> More chapter titles from Mutual Benefit's "Sinking Stone":
> 
> _You are the first thing I see  
>  When I open my eyes when I wake from a dream  
> You're the light through a rip in the seams  
> Bursts forth from the night onto dark stars it clings_
> 
> _But with the morning sun we also see  
>  That its shapes appear so gradually  
> I'm so afraid to feel this way again  
> But I let you in_
> 
> ~

Hank doesn’t wake up with the worst headache of his life, which is how he usually feels after a night like the last one. His head still fucking hurts, but he doesn’t feel like he’s going to die, and that’s a welcome change.

He doesn’t try to get up yet. 

Connor is still in bed, too, which is something of a relief - Hank half expected he would be out making breakfast by the time he woke up, and that it would be the very best breakfast Hank had in years, and then he’d have to figure out how to pay Connor back for _that_ , too. 

This is honestly preferable, even if seeing his face right away does remind Hank that he has some apologizing to do.

They shifted at some point in their sleep, moved closer together - Connor is tucked in to Hank’s side, his head propped ever so slightly against Hank’s chest. He’s in stasis, his face impassive, not quite as pliant as a sleeping human, but still looser than he usually is.

His face is normally so expressive that Hank decides it’s a little strange for there to be _nothing_ playing across it except for the red of Connor’s LED spinning on his temple.

Red isn’t always bad, Hank knows from some experience on the cases back in November and an embarrassing amount of internet research about androids within the last week he’s known Connor. It can mean something as harmless as processing information, even if the harsh color looks like distress.

Even knowing that, though, Hank still closes an arm around Connor’s shoulders without thinking, like he’s trying to shield him from something.

He thinks, briefly and wildly, about kissing Connor awake, and about calling him baby, and maybe figuring out if the weird neck port thing so many forums mentioned works for him. He doesn’t, mostly because he thinks they’re okay after last night, but he also doesn’t always trust his drunk self to read a room and know where he stands with people.

He gently shakes Connor’s shoulder instead. It doesn’t take much disturbance before Connor opens his eyes. He glances around at Hank’s hand on his shoulder when he does, but he doesn’t try to move away, only tucks his head back into Hank’s chest.

“How are you feeling?” Connor asks, lifting an arm to wrap around him - a good sign, Hank thinks.

“Like shit. But I did it to myself. Are you okay?”

Connor twists enough to look up at him with a sleepy smile. “Why wouldn’t I be okay, Hank?”

Hank taps Connor’s LED. “You were red there for a while.”

“Oh. I’m fine. It’s just something that happens in stasis.” Connor stretches against him. “I can get up and make you breakfast, if you want.” 

Hank tightens his arm around him before he can try to move. “Don’t you dare.”

“Aw,” Connor says, like he always does when he’s going to tease him. “Did you want to cuddle?”

“Yeah.” Hank lays his aching head back on his pillow and closes his eyes. “Sure. I want to cuddle.” 

Connor props his chin on Hank’s chest so he can look at him. “Are you just trying to stop me from making breakfast?”

“I think you’ve done about enough for me for one day, don’t you?”

“I don’t mind, though,” Connor says softly. “Hank?”

“Yeah?” 

“Don’t scare me like that again. Or at least call me if you’re having a bad night.”

Hank can’t promise anything, he knows, but he wishes he could. “Yeah,” he says. “I’ll try, sweetheart.”

“Okay. I’m glad you’re okay.”

“Yeah,” Hank says.

He guesses he’s glad he’s okay, too.

There are little things about waking up beside someone that Hank didn’t even realize he missed until this moment - the reassuring, grounding weight of a head against his chest, and a leg tangled with his, and hair to absently card his fingers through while he drifts somewhere between asleep and awake.

They lie there in silence for a few minutes, and Hank wonders if Connor has something like a listless middle of the road, too, or if he can only be wholly awake or asleep, with no in between. 

He files it away to ask him someday. 

Right now, what Hank does is crack an eye open and say, “You know that your hair hair is like...ridiculously fucking soft?”

He feels Connor smile against him. “It’s not really hair.”

No, of course it isn’t, but hell if it doesn’t do the trick. 

“Hank,” Connor says against his chest, voice soft. He sounds like he’s thinking about something, so Hank waits, but Connor doesn’t follow it with anything.

“Yeah?” he says after a moment, gently jostling Connor’s shoulder. 

Connor sighs. “It’s okay if you don’t, but you can kiss me, if you want to.”

There’s something sad in Connor’s voice, something timid and self-conscious that’s nowhere near the confidence he’s always exuded when he’s made similar offers in the past. Hank squeezes his shoulder, craning his neck to look at his face. “What happened to the self-assured swagger?”

Connor shrugs. “I’m worried I pushed you too hard, and I don’t want to do that again. But I like kissing, and I like you kissing me especially, so I think the best thing to do is to tell you that you can anytime and hope that you will.”

“Hey. You didn’t push me, honey.”

Connor couldn’t possibly look more skeptical. “I told you to come make out with me. During your awards ceremony. In front of your captain.”

Hank loved that, honestly. It was the most wanted and the most alive he’s felt in years. He doesn’t want Connor to regret it. “Yeah,” he says, “but I followed you out. I’m not sorry I followed you.” Hank crooks a finger under Connor’s chin, tilting his face up to meet his eyes. “I’ve done the shit I did last night for three years, okay? You didn’t cause that, in any way. It was nice. Ditching that godawful ceremony for a few minutes and kissing you instead was...really fucking nice.”

Connor shifts a bit, and Hank moves so they’re lying on their sides, facing each other. “I’d like it if you kissed me now, too,” he says softly.

It hurts, how much Hank wants to, how much he wants Connor, and he’s afraid of it, but god, he wants to kiss him, too. “Let me go brush my teeth...”

Connor catches Hank by the wrist. “I don’t have human taste buds...” 

“Yeah, I’m still going to...”

“And my oral analysis components are sensitive enough that it doesn’t make much difference whether someone brushes their teeth or not. I still get all the data.”

Hank snorts, shaking his head fondly. “You’re so gross,” he says, but he might as well be saying something much sweeter for all the softness in his voice.

In the end, he doesn’t get up to brush his teeth yet. But he does put a hand on Connor’s cheek and brush a thumb over his freckles, and he does kiss him once, and then again, and again.

It’s not entirely real, of course - it can’t be real if Hank is paying Connor for his companionship - but Hank has already learned in this last week that Connor makes it so easy to pretend.

It’s why Hank likes him.

It’s probably why all his other clients like him, too. 

But Connor knows how to kiss him like Hank is the only one he ever has, and Hank does better for himself when he has someone else to take care of, so they’re a sort of perfect pair, even if it’s in a different way than usual.

Connor’s hands are warm on Hank’s neck, and he’s smiling against Hank’s mouth while he kisses him, and it feels so good that it’s almost enough to distract Hank from his raging headache.

Connor must feel him wince, though, because he parts from him just far enough to say, “Do you want me to get you some pain medicine?” 

What Hank wants, if he’s being entirely honest, is to not let Connor leave his bed until he feels like he’s properly apologized to him for last night, but that’s unreasonable, probably, since he doesn’t know if any apology will ever feel like enough.

“I can get it,” Hank says. “I need to get up and let Sumo out anyway.” 

Connor looks so affronted that Hank can’t help but kiss the delicate furrow in his brow.

Or, at least, it looks delicate, right up until the moment Connor twists Hank onto his back and lands straddling his hips and pressing Hank’s wrists into his pillow above his head. 

“Stay here,” he says, pushing down on Hank’s wrists. 

“Connor…”

“Stay here. I’ll get your handcuffs if I have to.” Connor neatly swings himself off of Hank’s lap and onto the floor, giving him a small smile when all Hank can do is gape after him.

Hank does stay right where he is, mostly because his mind can’t stop hiccuping over the promise in the words.

There’s a part of him that’s uncomfortable with the thought of letting things get any more physical between the two of them - holding hands, kissing, cuddling, that’s all one thing, but he doesn’t want to take advantage, or to be the kind of person who has to pay someone to fuck him, and he _definitely_ doesn’t want to trick himself into thinking this is something more serious or permanent than it is.

His dick isn’t quite in agreement with him about that, though.

Hank lies there, listening to Connor letting Sumo out and fishing around in the medicine cabinet and then, to his chagrin, cooking something in the kitchen. He thinks that it’s nice, the sounds that come with the house being a little fuller again. 

He wants to kiss Connor, and hold his hand, and to be able to live with that being all he ever gets, because he knows that’s all he should take. He shouldn’t let Connor take up more space in his life than he already has...but it’s difficult to remember in this moment why that might be bad for both of them.

That’s the problem with pretending, Hank thinks. When two people are good at it, it’s so easy to forget the terms of their agreement in the first place.

Connor comes back with a plate of eggs and toast in hand, and he laughs outright when he sees Hank right where he left him. “I didn’t actually mean you couldn’t move,” he says, seating himself on the edge of the bed and passing the plate to Hank.

“Yeah, whatever,” Hank says. He’s grateful for the food - it gives him somewhere else to direct his attention. “My head just hurts too much to move.”

“Here.” Connor passes him two pills and puts a glass of water on the table. He watches Hank eat, and when the plate is empty, he says, “I’d like to talk about our next date...if that’s okay with you. I’ve compiled a list of activities you might enjoy...”

“Oh, Jesus,” Hank groans. Of course Connor has done exactly that. 

Connor sets his jaw. “I understand if you don’t want to continue our relationship, but sometimes planning what to do is the hardest part, which is why I...”

“Fuck, no,” Hank says quickly. “I want to see you again. It’s just...what do _you_ want to do?”

Connor blinks owlishly at him, like he doesn’t quite understand the question. "I ran an algorithm overnight and have a number of ideas that I think you would really enjoy..."

An algorithm. Hank would laugh if he didn't think it might hurt Connor's feelings. "I know, sweetheart," he says, reaching for Connor's hand. "I'd just like to do something you want to do, okay? I would enjoy that."

"You _really_ don't understand how hiring someone like me works, do you?" Connor asks. "It's supposed to be about _you_."

Hank sets his empty plate aside and leans back against his pillow. "Yeah," he says, smiling. "I don't get it at all. Now what do you want to do?"

"You're going to spoil me," Connor says dryly, "and then I'm going to turn into a brat."

Hank laughs at that before he can help himself. "Sorry, _turn into_ one?" 

Connor swats at him, not entirely masking his own amusement, and Hank catches him by the hand. "What do you want to do?" he asks again.

Connor sighs, climbing over Hank to the empty side of the bed so he can lie down beside him. "You have to promise not to laugh," he says, "because it's objectively very silly."

Hank shifts to face him and crosses his heart where Connor can see. "I promise."

“Okay. I want to take Sumo to the drive-in."

Hank gapes at him. "Wait. That's it?" 

"And maybe take him to a pet store and let him pick out a toy." Connor shrugs. "Dogs aren't allowed in my building, and a few of my other clients have pets, but I've never met them. I've never really gotten to spend time with a dog."

"Jesus, you're so fucking cute. Yeah, we can do that.” Hank doesn't know how Connor can go from pinning his wrists down above his head like some kind of murderbot to sheepishly asking to hang out with his dog within the span of half an hour, but it's one of the most endearing things about him.

"Careful, though," Hank adds, folding Connor into his arms and kissing his temple. "I'll think you're just sticking around with me for my dog."

"Hank, please," Connor sniffs. "I'm sticking around for your money." He twists in Hank's arms enough that he can nip at Hank's jawline. "And because you're hot." 

Hank scoffs at that, so Connor kisses him until he can't breathe and he has to pull back and gasp for air and they're both laughing.

Connor sighs, relaxing into Hank with a content smile on his face. "If I hadn't come here last night," he says, "would you have called me again?" 

"Probably not." Hank isn't proud of that, but it's true. Between Perkins and the way all work events make him feel and his argument with Connor in the car, he was ready to shrink back into his usual small world, his house and work and Jimmy's bar and nowhere else, because venturing out always seems to hurt worse than staying inside of it, at least in that first initial, uncomfortable push. "Not because of anything you said or did," he adds. "It would have been really stupid of me."

"Yes, it would have," Connor says softly. He strokes a thumb over Hank's face, looking at him with a certain softness in his eye. "I'm glad we're okay."

"Yeah," Hank sighs. "Me, too."

They stay in bed until noon, when Connor has to leave for another appointment with a client. He offers to call a cab, but Hank drives him home anyway.

And Hank is used to the pendulum swing, to the lowest point that always follows the highest, but he lets himself hope all over again, as he always does, that the low just won't come, that he's finally had his last one, that the relief he feels in this moment can last. 

It's naive, maybe. 

But he also thinks maybe this time it's true.

* * *

Connor’s drive-in movies play on Thursday, and he has appointments every night between now and then, so it’s five days before Hank sees him again.

Those days aren’t as hard as the week between their first meeting and Hank’s awards ceremony, with far fewer ups and downs. Any time Hank goes into his kitchen, he’s reminded that Connor got a cab to his house in the middle of the night and threw himself through the window, and it’s difficult for Hank’s brain to convince itself, no matter how it might like to, that this thing with Connor isn’t at least a little bit real when the physical evidence that Connor cares about him beyond their financial arrangement is right there.

Hank isn’t planning to text Connor that first night, or even over the next few days. He doesn’t think Connor will think he’s desperate...but he still doesn’t want to look desperate. 

So he’s surprised, and quite a bit pleased, when Connor texts him on Monday morning while Hank is getting ready for work.

“I was accessing some of my memory logs looking for something else,” the message says. “Do you want to see something funny?”

Hank wonders if he’ll look too overeager if he texts back right away, but in the end that doesn’t stop him. “Sure, baby.”

“I like you calling me baby :)” Connor writes back.

Hank is smiling at the message when a video attachment comes through. Curious, he plays it. He almost chokes on his breakfast laughing when he realizes it’s first-person footage of Connor launching himself through Hank’s kitchen window. It’s cropped and clipped so Hank can’t see himself passed out on the floor in it - only the good parts, Connor tumbling through the window with all the grace of a newborn fawn.

“Jesus Christ,” he writes back. “I’m saving this for when I need to knock you down a peg.” 

“Please do :)” Connor replies. “What are you doing right now?”

“Eating breakfast. I made eggs, but they’re worse than yours.”

“Those were a freebie,” Connor says. “If you want breakfast from me again, you’re going to have to put out.”

Hank’s cheeks heat. “Yeah?” he writes back. 

“Yes,” Connor replies. “I’m not cheap, Hank.”

“Of course you’re not, baby. What are you doing?”

“Running maintenance. Boring stuff.”

“Did you drink something sugary last night?” Hank asks.

“Aw. You remembered. :) Also yes. I need to get cleaned up before I go out tonight.”

Hank is trying to decide if he should tell Connor that he shouldn’t accept sugary drinks from anyone or if that will just sound possessive or territorial when another text comes through.

“Do you want to see? It’s weird. I know you like it when I’m weird. ;)” 

Of course he knows. It feels like Connor sees everything about him. For all Hank knows he accessed Hank’s browsing history while he was in the house, too, and he knows Hank has watched almost every video there is about android orgasms and how to reach them. 

“Sure,” Hank writes back, with the sort of confidence he usually only has when he’s had a few. “Show me.”

It’s a few minutes before the pictures come through, but when they do, Hank sees Connor’s abdominal port open, and some sort of vacuum hose attached to something inside - cleaning the biocomponents there, Hank assumes.

He looks at the port and the hose, but he also looks at the pale skin of Connor’s stomach, and the soft jut of his hip bones where they disappear under his sweatpants, and the little freckle above them that Hank wants desperately to latch onto and suck.

“Yeah,” he writes back to Connor, throat gone dry. “That’s weird.”

“Too weird?” Connor asks, and Hank doesn’t even have to think about it at all before he replies, “No <3”

"I'm really looking forward to seeing you on Thursday," Connor replies, and then, a moment later, "<3"

Hank isn't too proud to say that he screenshots the text or that he looks at it several times in the next few days when he catches himself starting to feel like shit. 

But then, he doesn’t think Connor would mind.

Jeff does chew him out for leaving with Connor in the middle of the ceremony when Hank gets in to work later that morning, which doesn't come as much of a surprise. Jeff isn't stupid, and even if he was, they made it plainly obvious. 

And Reed is an asshole like usual, and two of Hank's cases have child murder victims, which is something he's always struggled with since Cole. And he keeps watching cases with android victims pile up faster than they can investigate, which grates away at his cynicism, which is all to say that he looks at that little text message plenty.

On Wednesday, while Hank is at the grocery store for Sumo's food, he finds a small selection of little bow ties for dog collars in the pet aisle. Hank hasn't put anything on Sumo's collar beyond his tags in all the years he's had him, but he still picks one up and throws it into his cart.

The thing is, he knows Connor will notice it, and he thinks Connor will think it's cute, and trying to find things Connor likes is a powerful fucking motivator for him these days, apparently. 

On Thursday, Hank dresses in the nicest pair of jeans he has and a flannel shirt that Jeff got him for Christmas last year (probably a hint to dress nicer for work, honestly) and that he never wore. He stands looking into the mirror with his hair down, and then tied back, before he decides that looks like he's trying too hard and he lets it down again.

He puts the little plaid bowtie on Sumo's collar, and he realizes with too little time left to change that his shirt and the bowtie match, and that it looks like they both got dressed up for their date...which is way too cutesy for Hank's liking but probably the kind of gesture that Connor would appreciate and that he definitely deserves, so he even if he had time, he thinks he might let it alone.

Hank calls Connor when they get to his apartment. "Hey," he says when Connor picks up. "I'm outside. I'd come up and get you, but Sumo doesn't like being left in the car alone."

"That's okay," Connor says. He sounds happy, which is an instant balm on some of the shit Hank's dealt with at work that week. "I'll be right down."

It's unfair, really, the way something in Hank's chest tightens the moment he sees Connor stepping out of his apartment, and it's unfair that Connor can make the sweater and pair of slim fit jeans he’s wearing look so good, and it's unfair that Hank can't empty his entire savings account and give all of it to Connor so he doesn't have to make men feel interesting and young and wanted anymore (an impossibility because Connor is far too proud to take it, not because Hank wouldn't do it).

"Hey, handsome," Connor says when he gets into Hank's car.

(He's good at his job, because Hank feels _so_ interesting and young and wanted, and he always forgets exactly how powerful a drug that is until he's with Connor again.)

"Hi, sweetheart," he says, trying not to sound too enamored and probably failing. 

Connor reaches for him with a smile and kisses him, tongue sliding over Hank's for a moment long enough that it makes Hank a little breathless, before he says, "I was talking to Sumo," against Hank's mouth.

Hank grins and kisses him again. "Of course you were."

Connor turns in his seat to pet Sumo while Hank puts the car in gear and pulls away from the sidewalk. "Hi, Sumo," he says. He ruffles the dog's fur, although he stills when he notices the collar. "Did you get him a bowtie? For the drive-in?"

"Yeah," Hank says, shrugging. "I haven't gone many places the last few years, so he hasn't, either. He should get to be dressed up." 

Connor leans over the console and kisses Hank’s cheek. "He looks good," he says, taking Hank’s hand the way he always does in the car, "and so do you." 

Hank thinks about buying Connor a house and a dog and whatever else he wants, and he thinks he gets why the sugar daddy thing has some appeal (even if Connor resented that label). 

He thinks that Connor deserves to be safe and happy and okay.

They go to the pet store first, so Connor can have the experience of letting Sumo pick out a toy, like he wanted. (Hank did this for Sumo twice before he realized that Sumo only picks toys he’s going to immediately destroy, and then never again.)

Sumo is clearly excited about it, moving down the aisles with more enthusiasm than Hank has seen out of him in years, and Connor is trying to mask how pleased he is by the entire thing, but if the look in his eye is any indication, he’s having a good time, too. 

Sumo pulls a big, stuffed lamb from the bottom shelf and brings it back to show to them.

“Is this okay?” Connor asks as he bends to take the toy from Sumo. 

“He’s going to destroy that by tomorrow,” Hank says.

Connor looks down at the toy and shrugs. “He picked it.” 

Connor shows his disappointment in two ways, Hank has learned. He has his more flamboyant pout that he uses when he’s trying to tease Hank, and he has a very subtle, carefully masked hint of melancholy that will sometimes creep into his voice when he doesn’t want Hank to know he’s upset.

Hank catches the faintest note of the latter, and he doesn’t understand why, but he quickly takes the toy from Connor and says, “Yeah. It’s okay. He only destroys the toys he really loves anyway.”

Hank picks up a bone to keep Sumo busy during the movie, and Connor pays at the register even though he isn’t supposed to pay for anything when they’re together, and it occurs to Hank all at once as they’re walking to the car that of course the thought that Sumo wouldn’t get to keep the toy he picked bothered Connor. 

He wonders how many decisions Connor made on his path to deviancy that were overwritten by someone who thought they knew better, Perkins or an officer with the DPD or a CyberLife programmer or anyone else. How many times did Connor get his hand slapped for wanting something instead of just being allowed to have it?

Connor gives the stuffed lamb to Sumo once they’re back in the car, and Hank watches in the rear view mirror as Sumo takes it, squeaking it a few times before he rests his head on it.

Huh, Hank thinks. Maybe he’s mellowed out.

He’ll have to find a way to thank the dog later for the soft smile on Connor’s face.

The drive-in is showing Toy Story 2 this week, but Connor keeps looking at him like he does when he wants something, so Hank wonders as he pays for their vehicle how much of it they’ll watch. 

There’s a sign posted that says dogs have to remain leashed, but the lot is almost empty, so Hank still lets Sumo climb out of the car on his own. He puts a few blankets down for the dog, and Sumo settles there, content with his bone.

“The sleeping bag is new,” Connor says as he digs through the blankets in Hank’s trunk.

“I was a little cold last time.”

“You should have told me,” Connor says, squeezing Hank’s arm as he passes him to set up their seat on the hood of the car. “I could have turned my internal temperature up to keep you warm.” 

“You have a space heater function?” Hank teases him. Connor swats at him, and Hank catches him by the wrist and pulls him in to kiss him. “You want a drink or anything?”

“I’m okay,” Connor says, hoisting himself onto the hood of the car and slipping into the sleeping bag. 

Hank actually is hungry, but Connor is a magnetic force, and he ends up joining him on the hood of the car, telling himself he’ll walk over to the concession stand later and knowing he won’t - his time with Connor is limited, and he won’t want to miss a moment of it 

“You comfortable?” Hank asks, leaning back against the windshield.

Connor tucks himself under Hank’s arm and kisses the corner of his mouth. “Yeah,” he whispers.

They don’t watch much of the movie at all - it’s maybe fifteen minutes in before they’re making out in the sleeping bag like teenagers. And Hank is so lost in it, in the night and the adoration in Connor’s eyes that he desperately wants to believe is real and the softness of Connor’s mouth as his lips part under Hank’s, that he barely thinks about his reservations about the physical part of their relationship. 

He just gives in to it.

(And it feels so good, giving in to Connor, letting him have what he wants, so good that Hank wonders why he ever considered doing anything else.)

It’s okay, he tells himself. It’s real in a different way, but still real. Connor trusts him enough to tell him what he wants and what he doesn’t, and that’s Hank’s primary concern. He wants to be good for Connor, and to take care of him.

(His second concern is that he’ll get hurt when this ends, but that one is hard to remember when he’s with Connor, because Connor makes him feel like this could go on forever if he wanted it to.) 

Connor has a hand tangled in Hank’s hair and the other fisted in Hank’s shirt, breathing hard into Hank’s mouth as he kisses him, occasionally rocking into him with the smallest buck of his hips.

Hank thinks about asking if he can open his neck port. He wonders if anyone has ever done that for Connor before. There are only two other cars in the lot, parked far away from them. If they’re quiet...

Connor beats him to it. “Hank,” he says, leaning his forehead against Hank’s when they part for air. “Can I tell you something?” 

“Yeah,” Hank says, a little lightheaded still just from the kissing alone, like he’s floating somewhere above himself. “Sure, baby.”

“I should have had this conversation sooner, before we got to this point, probably. There just wasn’t a good time...” 

“For what?” Hank asks, confused.

“Fuck, there’s probably a better way to do this,” Connor says, but he grasps Hank’s hand inside the sleeping bag, and he pulls it between his legs and presses it against his groin.

Hank’s fingers graze a distinctive outline through Connor’s jeans, hot and hard, and Connor makes a soft noise and buries his face against Hank’s neck.

Hank doesn’t know if it would be polite or not to pull his hand back, but he’s too surprised to move. “Your profile said...” he starts, like it matters that Connor’s website said he wasn’t equipped for sexual activity, like he doesn’t plainly have his hand on Connor’s cock.

“I know,” Connor says. “I never updated it. I thought it was safer and easier if I could pick who to tell.” He presses himself a bit closer to Hank. “Is this okay?”

“Fuck,” Hank says. “Yeah, fuck. But it was okay before, too. I wanted you before. You know that, don’t you?” 

“I know,” Connor says against Hank’s neck, and then there’s the pinch of teeth grazing over the skin there. “That’s why I’m telling you.” His fingers brush over Hank’s. “Please touch me”

Hank doesn’t know how he would even begin to argue with that.

Hank presses the heel of his hand down between Connor’s legs, just enough to make Connor bite his lip in response (and Hank quickly decides he wants to make him do that again and again, that he could get addicted to the sound). He folds a hand around Connor’s neck, teasing a finger over his skin until he feels the barely perceptible hinge in Connor’s chassis plating, the access door for his neck port, underneath his synth-skin.

Connor shivers against him. “Hank Anderson,” he says, soft and teasing, “you’ve done your research.”

“It wasn’t what I was looking for originally,” Hank says. “I just sort of stumbled on it.” 

Connor doesn’t seem offended at all - he looks profoundly pleased, and Hank thinks all at once of him sitting in the coffee shop the first morning, how he seemed cavalier and vain on the surface during that meeting, except that Hank knows now how badly Connor needs to be wanted and accepted for what he is.

Connor kisses him again, slow, lazy. “What were you looking for?”

“I don’t know,” Hank says. “Nothing, really. I just wanted to know whatever I could about you.”

“Fuck, you’re so cute,” Connor says against his mouth. 

Hank presses down on the hinge of the little port at the back of his neck. The implication is probably clear, but Hank still says, “I want to do this for you. If you want me to.”

“God,” Connor whispers. “Yes, but not here. We need to be quiet, and I won’t be able to be if you do that to me.”

Hank has done enough reading to know the neckport thing - not that any access port won’t work, but Hank wants to start with the neck, with Connor’s head cradled gently in his hands so he can see his face - works in part because the intrusion of a foreign object in the ports is sensory overload, that it fucks with androids’ base processes a little, kind of like smoking does for Connor. Like getting high and getting off all at once. 

And Hank likes that a little bit (or maybe a lot).

Connor is always so perfectly in control of himself that the thought of him letting Hank fuck with his systems a bit is one of the single most arousing things Hank has ever thought about, to the point where sticking his fingers into the wires inside Connor’s neck hardly even seems weird to him anymore.

He’s pleased that Connor wants him to, even if it isn’t tonight.

“Are you going to be quiet if I do this?” Hank asks, dragging the heel of his hand over Connor’s cock. He’s genuinely asking, but he’s also teasing him a bit, and Connor drops his head to Hank’s shoulder to stifle the little moan Hank pulls out of him.

“I don’t know. I think so. You can put your fingers in my mouth if I can’t.”

“Jesus Christ,” Hank says. “Is that something you’ve thought about?” 

“Yeah,” Connor whispers. “My oral processing units are very sensitive.”

“Jesus,” Hank chokes out, and there’s one last rational shred of clarity that tells him they should probably get in the car and drive somewhere better for this, his house or even Connor’s apartment. 

He ignores it, though. Because he feels young and hopeful and so fucking invincible, and he hasn’t felt that way in years and doesn’t know how Connor is so good at bringing it out of him, but fuck it. He hasn’t given some guy a handjob at a movie theater since he was a teenager who wouldn’t even call himself bi out loud, and he likes that he feels bold and desperate and wanted enough, like there’s finally a moment in his life that he just can’t fucking miss, to do it again.

“Okay, come here,” he says to Connor, sitting up straighter against the windshield and pulling Connor to sit between his legs, leaning him back against his chest. He hikes the covers up higher around their shoulders and turns to press a kiss to Connor’s hairline.

“You have to show me what you like,” he says in Connor’s ear, making him shiver again. He unfastens Connor’s belt and unzips his jeans, slipping his hand inside and teasing his fingers over the skin low on Connor’s belly. “Okay?”

Connor nods against him. Hank can hear him swallow. “And you have to tell me what else you’ve been thinking about.”

Mostly, especially the last few days, Hank’s been thinking that he would do anything for him.

And who knows, he thinks as he slips his hand lower and wraps his fingers around hot velvet skin, as Connor twists to press his face to Hank’s neck, letting out a low, soft whine.

Maybe he’ll tell him.

It's not a romantic thought - or if it is, it's romantic in a weird as fuck way - but Hank's first thought as he feels the weight of Connor's cock in his hand, as he gives it an experimental pump and swipes his thumb over the head of it just to gauge Connor's reaction, is to wonder how much he spent on it.

It seems expensive, and Hank very genuinely means that as a compliment, although now hardly seems the time to say it. He can't see under the covers, but the size of it feels well suited to Connor's body, and there's a bead of fluid forming at the head of Hank when Hank runs his thumb over it again.

Connor hums and shifts against Hank's chest - Hank can feel his thirium pump working under his hand. He reaches for Connor's chin and tilts his head up so he can kiss him. 

Connor's hands fist where they can - fingers closing around Hank's shirt and grasping at his thigh - like he doesn't know what to do with them. "Here" Hank says, taking Connor's hand and guiding it over his as he strokes him again under the covers. "Show me what feels good, baby" 

Connor does. His hand tightens around Hank's, and Hank follows the pace he sets and learns exactly how Connor likes it, how firm and how fast. He commits it to memory, just in case he's ever fucking lucky enough to do this for him again. 

"Hank," Connor whines. He's running hot, his fingers searing Hank's cheek when he reaches up to touch him, and though he isn't moving much, Hank is distinctly aware of every breath in him and every subtle writhing motion of Connor's body against his. 

He presses his forehead to Hank's cheek, skin burning. He chokes around a moan that he doesn't come anywhere near silencing, and Hank raises two fingers to press to his lips, a threat and a promise.

Connor darts his tongue out to taste Hank's skin, looking at him with pupils blown wide.

"Flatter me," he whispers, although it's so much different from the way he said it that morning in the coffee shop, small and timid and hesitant and so desperate.

It's been a long time, and Hank's out of practice with dirty talk (and even more so with soft words), but it still comes pouring out of him easily.

"I wish I could see all of you," he whispers, cheek pressed to the top of Connor's head, breath catching when Hank gives Connor a firm stroke and Connor rocks his hips back into him. "You're so good, baby. You're so fucking good. God, you're gorgeous." 

"You can't...see me," Connor says, voice soft and breathy, although that teasing note Hank loves is still distinctly there. 

"Yeah," Hank says. "But I know you're pretty, sweetheart. You have no idea, the things I want to do to you." 

"Tell me," Connor whispers.

He takes Connor's earlobe between his teeth and slips two fingers into Connor's mouth when he moans too loudly at the sensation. His saliva is odd, thick and viscous against his skin, but Connor sinks his teeth gently into the flesh of Hank's fingers and Hank thinks it's also one of the single hottest things he's ever experienced.

"I want you to open your neck port for me," Hank says in his ear. "And I want to put my fingers inside you and play with your wires until they heat up and your systems go offline. I don't want you to be able to think straight beyond what I'm doing to you. I want to take care of you."

Connor gets louder, the noises muffled by Hank's fingers in his mouth, every sound sending a vibration through Hank that thrums low in his belly. 

"That's it, sweetheart," Hank whispers into his hair, keeping the pace of his hand on Connor's cock steady even as Connor's movements grow erratic. He's tense, his body strung tight in a way Hank recognizes. 

"Yeah," Hank breathes against him. "Come for me, baby." 

Connor does, biting down on Hank's fingers in his mouth as Hank strokes him through it, and then flicking his tongue over the abused skin as he comes down. He shifts back against him, sagging into him when Hank gathers him into his arms and kisses his temple. 

"Was that okay?" Connor asks softly. 

There it is again, that little hint of vulnerability and uncertainty peeking through, as if Connor didn't just guide Hank's hand between his legs with all the confidence in the world minutes ago. Hank thinks maybe Connor has his own pendulum swing.

He grasps Connor's chin and kisses him. "Was it good for you?" he asks, and Connor nods against him.

"It's just...it's not the most romantic location, and it wasn't the plan. I just lost control." 

"That's deeply flattering to me," Hank says wryly, "and I've had less romantic locations." 

Connor smiles and shifts to reach for Hank's belt. "Can I return the favor?"

"Next time, baby," Hank says, wrapping an arm around Connor's shoulders and kissing his forehead. He's sure Connor genuinely wants to, but what Hank wants is for Connor to relax and for tonight to be about him.

And it's easier, giving Connor what he needs, than it is to ask for what he wants.

He'll get there, he thinks. He feels better than he has in years, but it’s still an idea that will take some getting used to.

Hank fishes his handkerchief from his pocket and helps Connor clean up, and then he pulls Connor in close to him and kisses him again and again, because he can. Connor curls against him, relaxed and pliant, and Hank feels impossibly warm.

It’s nice, Hank decides all at once. Sumo is gnawing on his bone on the blankets beside the car, and Connor is heavy against him and overheated from the exertion, making the space under their covers cozy and warm, and Hank thinks it’s so fucking nice to feel surrounded, for once, by good things.

He doesn’t realize Connor has gone into stasis until the movie is almost over, when he looks down to say something to him and finds his eyes closed. “Hey,” Hank whispers, nudging him. “Baby?”

Connor always comes out of stasis quickly, like he’s never truly unaware of his surroundings. Hank wonders if that’s exhausting, but given the smoking, maybe he already has his answer.

“Sorry,” Connor says. “I needed to recalibrate some settings. And I like going into stasis next to you.”

“Did I knock a few of your screws loose?” Hank asks wryly. It’s mostly a neutral question. He’s long past the days of chest-puffing and bragging, but he feels just the smallest bit self-satisfied anyway.

Connor elbows him. “Don’t be crass,” he chides him before he nips at Hank’s earlobe and says in a low whisper, “But also yes.” 

Hank wonders if Connor knows how good that feels, and he thinks there’s not anywhere near enough money in his bank account to pay him what it’s worth.

Connor smiles at him and hops off the hood of the car to watch the end of the movie sitting on the blankets with Sumo. Hank watches them for a moment, Sumo laying his head in Connor’s lap and Connor’s pleased smile, before he gets down to join them.

“What did you think?” Hank asks when the credits roll. He likes Connor’s thoughts about things like this - his perspective is so different than anything else Hank has ever known, and he likes seeing things the way Connor does.

Connor laughs. “That I’m going to have to download it and watch it again before we see the third one next week. I wasn’t paying attention to much of it.”

Hank isn’t too proud to admit that he feels terribly flattered.

When they get in the car to go home, Hank reaches for Connor’s hand, even though Connor is usually the one to lace their fingers together. It’s become a habit, maybe, but he barely thinks about it.

He clears his throat as they pull out of the lot. “So. How much does a lifelike working dick run these days?”

That startles a laugh out of Connor, the loud one Hank loves that he only does when he’s surprised. “More than I care to admit,” he says. “It was supposed to be for work, but...you know. It’s mostly just been for me in the privacy of my apartment so far.”

Hank’s mind stumbles hard over the thought of Connor jerking off and exploring his own body, and Connor knows it, if the little smile in his face when Hank looks over at him is any indication. 

“I’m honored, then,” Hank says, half joking and all serious. “What does the privilege of touching your expensive dick cost? I’ll add it on to the bank transfer when we get back to your place.” 

Connor hums and then shrugs. “I don’t know. I haven’t made it an option for anyone else.” 

Hank wonders if Connor is saying he’s his first, and he thinks of Connor saying, “We all need a first for everything. I’m pleased to be yours,” in the coffee shop, and he finds that he’s very fucking pleased, too.

“Besides,” Connor continues, “I can’t charge for something that wasn’t for your benefit.”

“Hey,” Hank says, squeezing his hand. “I haven’t felt that good in months. Not for my benefit, my ass.”

“You didn’t let me...” 

“Yeah, Jesus, Connor, I know I didn’t, but still. Look, you’re all young and beautiful forever, so maybe this doesn’t make sense to you, but you get to a certain age, especially when you’ve been alone for a while, where it’s just nice to know you’ve still got it. Okay?” 

Connor considers it before saying, “Okay. You can tip me for it if you want, but you don’t have to...and you do still have it.”

It’s the sort of thing Hank could get addicted to hearing.

“Listen,” Connor says as they turn onto his street, “I know this might not work with Sumo, but you can spend the night, if you want.”

“Shit,” Hank says. He feels bad for it, especially considering the dog had a good night too, but he suddenly wishes he had left Sumo at home. “He gets anxious in homes he doesn’t know.” 

“That’s okay,” Connor says quickly. “I just wanted to offer.”

It occurs to Hank that he could offer for Connor to come home with them, but that feels like risking his good luck somehow. Tonight felt good, but wanting too much feels foreign and dangerous, and Hank doesn’t know how to do it all at once. 

“Next time,” he says as they pull up outside of Connor’s apartment and he leans over to kiss him. “If you want to.” 

Hank waits to pay Connor until after he’s out of the car, because he tips him several hundred beyond the rate they’ve agreed on for dates lasting five hours or fewer, and he knows Connor would protest if he could.

So he doesn’t give him the chance to, especially when he’s still certain it’s far less than Connor is worth.

When he gets home, there’s a text from Connor on his phone. “That was generous, Hank,” it says. “Would you like me to throw in something extra?”

“You need the money, and I think you’re worth more than you charge,” Hank writes back. “It’s really fine.”

“Are you sure, Hank? I have something for you.”

“Okay, fine. What is it?”

In retrospect, maybe Hank should have seen it coming, but he’s unprepared for the black lace of the lingerie Connor is wearing in the picture that comes through, the peek of his nipples through the sheer fabric of the bralette and the length of his legs accentuated by the high rise of the panties.

Of course Connor has lingerie. _Of course_ he does.

“Fuck, sweetheart,” Hank writes back, because he’s stupefied and can’t think of anything else. 

Connor’s reply is immediate and torturous. “Good night, Hank ;)”.

Hank thinks Connor is very good at his job, to the point where it doesn’t feel like he’s doing a job at all. He feels better than he has in years.

And that’s something, isn’t it?

It occurs to Hank later, long after he’s gotten in bed, and after he’s looked at that picture of Connor sprawled in his bed, posed so it looks casual and haphazard - even though Hank is sure Connor was very aware and intentional about what every inch of him was doing as he took it - that maybe there’s an element of pettiness to this on Connor’s part.

Not vindictive pettiness, exactly. Just the sort where he’s upset that Hank couldn’t stay the night, and so he’s decided to torture him with photo evidence of everything he’s missing. 

It matters to Connor, having Hank’s attention.

And that’s petulant and it’s sweet all at the same time, much in the same way Connor is.

Hank looks at the photo one more time before he opens his message thread with Connor, stares at it for a long moment before he types, “I saved this picture. Just so you know.”

If Connor thinks his attention feels good for whatever reason, Hank can throw him a bone - Connor has given him plenty, after all.

“I hoped you would,” Connor writes back. Hank imagines him thrown across his bed in the black lace set as he texts him, but he’s probably changed by now.

“Hey,” Hank writes, because he’s feeling bold, “what are you wearing now?”

“Will you be disappointed if I say sweatpants and a t-shirt?” 

“Of course not, baby.” 

There’s an attachment in Connor’s next message, and when Hank opens it, it’s another picture - Connor in a baggy t-shirt, one knee drawn up to his chest. He’s wearing the same sweatpants Hank got to know well while he slept in Connor’s lap the night Connor broke in. His hair is a little messed up, his expression soft, and despite the late hour and being on first shift tomorrow, Hank is tempted to drive halfway across the city back to Connor’s apartment just so he can kiss that little freckle above his collarbone. 

“You’re cute,” Hank writes back, and he saves that picture, too. “I wish I could have stayed.”

“I know you do. It’s okay.” 

Hank is moving to set his phone down when it vibrates again. There’s another message from Connor that says, “I showed you mine, you know.” 

“Are you...asking for a pajama picture?” Hank writes only after he types and deletes, “Are you asking for a dick pic?” He doesn’t want to give Connor any ideas he hasn’t already had.

“Yeah,” Connor writes back. “I want to see you.” 

It’s endearing when Connor sends pictures - Connor is wildly photogenic and ridiculously beautiful, and someone would have to be insane to not enjoy a picture of him just from a sheer aesthetic perspective.

Hank is well aware that he isn’t the same, especially now, in the ratty boxers and stained t-shirt he changed into for bed.

He takes a picture anyway, mostly because he’s feeling good tonight, carefree and just a touch wild. The image is just from the chest down since he’s in bed, and it isn’t posed nicely the way Connor’s are, but Hank looks at it for a moment and then sends it before he can lose his nerve.

“You’re so fucking hot,” Connor writes back immediately, “and those boxers are a crime against humanity and need to be replaced immediately. Want to go shopping this weekend? I have some time on Sunday afternoon.”

“You want me to go shopping for underwear with you?” Hank asks.

“Yes. :) You can buy me something new, too...if that’s any incentive.”

It is, much as Hank doesn’t care to admit it. “Yeah,” he says. “Okay.”

“It’s a date :),” Connor writes back. “Goodnight, Hank.”

If he was someone else, maybe Hank would think that he could die happy right now, but he's never understood that phrase. Dying happy, dying sad, dying alone...in the end, you're still just dead.

But he does think that, for the first time in a really fucking long time, he feels something other than ambivalence about whether he wakes up tomorrow.

And that doesn't sound like much, maybe, but considering that Hank has felt nothing but ambivalence for years, it feels like a hell of a lot.

* * *

Work is a shit show the next day.

It's not any one big thing, really. It's a bunch of little things - the crime scene photos with the child victims still in his case files, and Reed being an asshole, and his constant awareness that he's only about a week away from the anniversary of the day Jen moved out and he said goodbye to Cole.

It was the right thing for Cole, for her to have primary custody. Hank knows that.

But losing your kid makes you think of every little moment where the tides changed, and all the missed opportunities because of it, and so every March Hank thinks about how he had Cole all the time, and then he didn't, and how much he missed without ever knowing that time was so precious.

The thing about having a kid is that you just sort of assume your child is going to outlive you, even when you know bad shit happens every day.

So those little things, the case files and the anniversary of the first time Hank lost Cole but not the last, combine until they feel so much worse.

By the time Hank gets off work, the only thing that stops him from driving to Jimmy's is Connor - that Connor would know somehow, that he would be disappointed, that he would tell Hank he thought he was doing better and Hank would have to explain that he was and then he wasn't, and how that's always the way this goes for him, and he doesn't know if he's ever just going to be okay again without things inevitably falling apart. 

He doesn't entirely manage not to drink at home, either, although he's out of whiskey, and the beer in the fridge hardly affects him anymore. He drinks three, opens a fourth and doesn't finish it, puts the tv on and doesn't watch it. He thinks about calling Connor and worries, perhaps irrationally at this point, that he would be overstepping their boundaries (and that's stupid, he knows it's stupid, because Connor told him that first night that Hank could call him if he wanted, and every time he's seen him since then, but Connor really nailed it when he guessed that Hank doesn't like the way his brain works, mostly because it does shit to him like this, makes him second-guess the way out until all he has left to do is spiral right on down.)

At one in the morning, Hank goes back to his bedroom, even though he knows he won't be able to sleep. He lies there with the oppressive weight of his own thoughts, his brain cycling nastily through every last thing that hurts.

He's still awake at two in the morning when Connor texts him, and Hank wonders ever so briefly if Connor has some way of hacking the camera on his phone, because how else would he always know?

"Hi," the message says when Hank opens it. "Are you awake?"

Hank thinks about ignoring it until tomorrow morning, just because he doesn't want to look like he doesn't have his shit together. But Connor already knows that, doesn't he? There’s nothing to gain from false pretenses, so he writes back.

"Hey, baby. Are you okay?"

"Yeah. I'm fine. Sometimes stasis is just hard," Connor's next message says, and that's somehow both completely foreign and entirely relatable.

"You too?" Hank asks. 

"Are _you_ okay, Hank?"

Hank considers it, but there's no good at all in lying. "Not really," he types. "Can I call you?"

"Please," Connor says. 

So that's what Hank does, with some relief filling him when he presses the button to dial.

"Hi, Hank," Connor says when he picks up.

"Hey, sweetheart."

"How can I help?"

"I don't know. Can we just talk for a bit?"

Hank's phone vibrates, and when he looks at it, there's a request to transfer the call to video. He hesitates, mostly because he looks like shit. But it's hard, saying no to Connor, so he presses the green button to accept it a moment later and props his phone on his nightstand as Connor's face brightens his screen.

"Aren't your phone and your camera in your head?" Hank asks when he comes into view. "Why do you have something external for video?"

"Um," Connor says. The lighting is low in his apartment, and he's wearing a white shirt with the top few buttons undone as he leans back in his chair. "I thought maybe I'd try out the camboy thing for a while when I first got the upgrade. It wasn't for me." 

Hank doesn't know if Connor is being serious or not. "No?" he asks.

"No. I did one stream, but I don't like being watched by people I haven't properly vetted."

"Yeah, Hank says. "That's probably fair."

Connor tilts his head. "What do you want to talk about?" 

Hank is reasonably sure Connor could recite a cookbook to him and it would feel better than lying here alone.

"Anything," he says, and Connor smiles.

"Do you want me to tell you about my day?" he asks wryly, and maybe he's joking, but Hank still nods against his pillow.

"Yeah. That would be good." He wants to ask what Connor meant by 'sometimes stasis is hard', too, but maybe that defeats the purpose of the distraction. 

"Okay," Connor says. "Markus called from D.C. this morning. He usually checks in every few weeks since I didn't go with them. There's not much news right now, but I like hearing from him anyway."

"Did they want you to go with them?" 

"Markus asked. But I would have felt wrong there...I was on the wrong side of things for too long, and I did some good at the end of it...but considering what I could do, and how I was built, I could have done a lot more."

"Hey. You didn't know. They built you not to know." 

Connor leans his temple on his hand as he looks at Hank. "I knew," he says softly. "I just didn't want to see it. Denial is a privilege, you know - one I took advantage of for far too long, because I didn't want to die again."

There's so much information in that one word - again - but Connor schools his face in the next moment and gives Hank that sweet smile that isn't exactly disingenuous but certainly isn't entirely authentic, either, before Hank can ask. "I went to my yoga class in there afternoon - there's a class that's basically dead in the afternoon when everyone is at work, and I don't think anyone who goes to it recognizes my face model, so I just pop my LED out and go relatively unnoticed."

"Huh,” Hank says. “Does that do anything for you? Yoga?"

Connor stretches his arms over his head - he has nice arms, Hank thinks, lithe but strong. "I don't have a muscular system that stretches in the same way humans' do, but I think it's relaxing, so I go when I have a few extra dollars lying around." There's a small glint in his eye in the moment before he says, "You should come with me sometime." 

"Fat fucking chance, kid. I don't think you in yoga pants is enough to override how much I would hate everything else about that."

"You sure? I could stand in front of you so you can watch me. I'm very flexible."

"Yeah,” Hank laughs. “I draw the line at goddamn yoga."

Connor shrugs, grinning. "Suit yourself." 

Hank rolls his eyes, although he's still smiling just a bit, too. "Did you have a date tonight?"

“Yeah,” Connor sighs.

"How was that?"

"It was okay."

"What did you do?"

Connor shakes his head. "I'd rather not talk about my other clients, if that's okay." 

"I'm not going to get jealous, honey. I know this is what you do, and I'm not really like that."

"I don't think you are," Connor says, "but I don't like thinking about them when I'm with you. It...doesn't feel good."

"Oh..." Hank says. "Okay. Sorry."

"Don't be sorry," Connor says softly. "I like you more than the rest of them, you know. I mean...they're fine. They're not like you."

"Sad as fuck?" Hank asks, a grim attempt at a joke, but Connor doesn't laugh. 

"No. They just aren't good to me the way you are."

"Oh," Hank says again. He doesn’t know what else to say.

Connor looks at him, soft and calculating all at once. “I think about you,” he says, voice quiet, “all of the time, Hank. I haven’t stopped thinking about you since I met you.” He leans forward the smallest bit in his seat. “Do you want to know what I think about?” 

Hank’s mouth has gone dry, and he doesn’t trust his voice not to come out in a croak if he tries to speak, so he just nods.

He doesn’t know how to do anything other than say yes.

Connor smiles. “I think about spending more time with you, to start with. Do you know how many times I’ve almost canceled a date with someone else just so I can text you instead? I think about filling every space in your life - cooking for you, and sitting on your couch, and playing with your dog, and sleeping in your bed.” He pushes a hand through his hair. “God, Hank, I think about your bed so much. At nights, when I can’t sleep and I have to calm myself down somehow. I’ve been getting myself off thinking about you for weeks.”

“Yeah?” Hank asks, and Connor smiles softly when it comes out a touch strangled. 

“Yeah,” he says, voice soft. “I think about kissing you, and about exploring every line of your body, and about reaching into your ugly as fuck boxers and feeling the weight of your cock in my hand.” He tilts his head. “I don’t have to breathe or swallow, you know. You could fuck my mouth as hard as you wanted and come down my throat and I could still stay between your legs and hold you between my lips for hours. Until morning, if you wanted.” He blinks, all innocence, like he hasn’t already destroyed Hank. “Would you like that?” 

“Fuck, Connor,” Hank whispers. “Would _you_?”

“I asked you first,” Connor says, “but I would. My analysis software is in my mouth...that would be the closest I could get to you. And I want to be that close, Hank. Very badly.” He tilts his head. “Do you want to know what else I want?”

Hank feels like he’s in a trance. He considers, very briefly, that perhaps he drank more than he thought he did tonight, that he’s dead and he doesn’t even fucking know if he’s in heaven or hell because Connor feels like a blessing and torture all at once. 

He nods again. Of course he does. Of course he wants to know.

“I’ve been thinking about how I would want things to go between us the first time since your awards ceremony,” Connor says. “I think I know. I want to handcuff you to the bed, and I want to fuck you until you come for me. Would you let me do that?”

Hank nods. He’s powerless to do anything other than nod. It’s been years and years, since college maybe, since anyone fucked him, but Connor can.

Connor can do anything he wants.

“Good,” Connor murmurs, sounding pleased. “Once you’ve come once and you’ve caught your breath, I want you inside me. I want to stretch for you, and feel your pulse inside mine, and I want you to fuck me like I need. My stamina is one of my features, but I want you to wear me out. I want your fingers in my mouth and in my neck port - I want you all around me so I can’t think about anything else but you. I only want to think about you. Can you do that?”

“Fuck, honey,” Hank groans. “Yes. I can fuck you the way you deserve.”

“Good,” Connor says. “That’s what I want...but mostly I just want you.” 

Hank is hard in his boxers, and, under the covers, he reaches down to press the heel of his hand against his straining cock, trying to give himself some small relief.

He doesn’t mean for Connor to see, but of course he does. Connor sees everything - he told Hank that himself. 

“It’s okay, Hank,” he breathes. “You can get yourself off, if you want. It might help you relax, maybe get to sleep.”

Hank has never done this before. He’s never let someone watch him, much less someone who isn’t in the room. He hesitates a moment, and Connor can tell. 

“Hank,” he says, voice soft. “It’s okay. You’re so fucking beautiful. Just let me see you.”

Hank doesn’t know when he makes the decision to push the covers aside, but he does.

And, as he slips a hand into his boxers, Connor watches.

"Are you going to watch the whole show?" Hank asks as he closes his fist around his cock - he doesn't entirely know what he's doing, only that he doesn't know how to stop. He's throbbing in his hand, already leaking, and he looks over to his phone screen and Connor's perfect face there in time to see his tongue dart out to wet his lips.

"I'd like to," he says, quiet and practical. "You aren't making it easy."

Hank frankly finds that offensive, considering that he pushed the covers aside and his hand is on his dick. "What..." he starts, but Connor casts a pointed glance in the direction of his boxers.

"Are we in this together, or aren't we?" Connor asks. "I told you I want to see you...if you're willing."

Hank sighs, but he doesn't protest. He hooks his thumbs under the waistband of his boxers, and he slides them down his legs until his cock springs free, laying heavy against his thigh.

Connor hums, a considering sound, as Hank takes himself in hand again and gives himself a slow stroke, even if there isn't much relief in it. "You're big," Connor says softly, with a hint of reverence.

It's ridiculous, probably, that Hank is fifty-three goddamn years old, and those words still flatter him like they would have when he was a teenager.

"Yeah?" he asks, mostly for something to say, because it seems weirder not to talk through this. 

Connor huffs a soft laugh. "Yes," he says. "Has anyone ever taken you entirely in their mouth before?" Hank can't answer around the groan that pulls itself from his lips, but Connor doesn't wait. "I'm sure not," he says, "but I could."

There's that pride Hank has come to know so well, flaring in Connor's eyes. "I know you could, baby. I know," he says, and he swears he can almost see Connor preening under the praise.

Hank swipes his thumb over the head of his cock, catching and spreading the pre-come gathered there, and he can hear Connor inhale beside him, see him leaning forward out of the corner of his eye, like he doesn't want to miss the details.

"I wish I was there," Connor says as Hank strokes himself more firmly. "I want to ride you. I want to pin your hands above your head, and..." 

"Because you want to torture me?" Hank asks wryly, and Connor cants his head to the side.

"Because I like that you trust me." The corner of his mouth pulls up into a smile. "And because I want to torture you. Just a bit."

"You can do whatever you want, sweetheart," Hank says, and it dies on a groan as he bucks up into his hand.

"I know," Connor murmurs. "You can, too. Anything you want." He inhales a breath he doesn't need, and Hank can hear the tremor in it. "Hank?"

Hank grits his teeth as he strokes over his cock again. "Yeah, sweetheart?" 

"I want to watch you come. I want you to come."

"Almost there, baby." There's sweat beading on Hank's forehead, cooling without the covers, the tendons in his forearms straining against the exertion.

Connor is quiet for a moment, watching with that calculating expression on his face, the only sounds the wet sound of skin tugging against skin. And then he leans forward and says, in the innocent voice that he only uses when he knows he's going to wreck Hank, "I want you to come like you're inside me, and you're trying to fill me up. I want to be full of it, Hank."

And damned if that isn't the thing that does it, that has Hank spilling into his fist and onto his belly with a low groan. He strokes himself through it, a few more lazy pumps, and Connor watches, and the thing of it is that Hank can feel a sort of admiration in the silence that he can't possibly be imagining. 

Connor waits for him to come down, for his breathing to steady, almost like he's monitoring it from the other side of their connection. "Feel better?" he asks when Hank feels his heart rate slowing, and it's such a genuine question, without an ounce of Connor's characteristic teasing to it, that Hank can feel his heart trying to break, just the smallest bit, in his chest.

"Yeah," he says softly, pulling his boxers back up around his hips.

"You should get cleaned up," Connor says. "I'll wait on the line." 

"It's okay," Hank says, grabbing for one of his dirty shirts on the floor and using it to wipe himself up. He flops back against his pillow, turning to look at Connor.

Connor gives him a small smile. “You should try to sleep.”

"What about you?" Hank asks. "You were having trouble sleeping, too." 

"I'm okay. I'm feeling better, too," Connor says. "I'll stay on the line with you, though, as long as you don't mind letting the call run."

"Yeah," Hank says, twisting onto his side to face him and closing his eyes. "That's fine, baby." 

"Hank," Connor says just as Hank is starting to drift off.

"Hmm?" Hank blinks his eyes open, vision bleary, in time to see Connor shake his head.

"Never mind," he says softly. "I'll tell you the next time I see you." 

Hank should protest, maybe. But Connor sounds content, and he feels pliant and sated and peaceful, and sleep comes easier than it has in years.

* * *

Hank’s breathing patterns indicate that he falls asleep at 2:56 am, after drifting on the edge of it for a short while. Connor picks up his camera and moves it to the empty side of his bed, sitting it there and curling on his side so it’s almost possible to imagine he and Hank are there together, facing each other.

He doesn’t try to enter stasis again - it’s one of those nights where he just can’t, where his systems are determined to feed him memory after memory to process, failure after failure, sometimes painful, sometimes deadly for the two marks that came before him.

But Connor doesn’t need to go into stasis tonight anyway - it’s just a habit, to sleep every night, to avoid his thoughts getting too loud while he’s awake.

They aren’t loud tonight, though. Or at least, they aren’t anymore. 

They’re quiet like the little breaths Hank is exhaling as he sleeps, peaceful in the same way. He watches Hank twist onto his back in his sleep, his mouth hanging open the smallest bit, and he’s never loved anyone before so maybe he doesn’t know, but Connor thinks he loves him. 

He was going to tell Hank that, and then he thought better of it, which is ironic, maybe, considering some of the filth that came out of his mouth earlier. But they’ve only known each other for a few weeks, and Connor worried he would seem naive if he said it, that Hank would think he was mistaking the emotion for something else.

(Hank wouldn’t. But it’s Connor’s fear, that he’s still too new to understand the mess of his own emotions, that maybe he never will.)

He’s going to say it. He just thinks it will be easier when he can feel Hank beside him, and that some things are meant to be said in person anyway.

Far less romantically - although Connor thinks Hank would be endlessly flattered if he knew - Connor is still hard in his jeans, hard and leaking internal lubricant in preparation for sexual activity. Any other night, he would do something about it. He has a small collection of toys in his nightstand, the most expensive of them designed to interface with his pleasure sensors and bring him off in minutes. And Hank is asleep - he could end the call so he could. 

But that’s the whole problem - Connor doesn’t want to end the call. He wants to lie here, and he wants to watch Hank sleep, and he wants Hank to hold him, and he wants to kiss him, and…

That’s when Connor makes the decision to call the cab, even though it’s four in the morning and pouring down rain outside, even though cabs are expensive so he tries to use them sparingly. He wants to kiss Hank, and he wants to tell him he loves him, and he doesn’t want to have to wait another five days until their next standing appointment to do it. 

There’s no parking at nights outside Connor’s apartment when everyone on the street is home, so the cab parks a full block up, and Connor is drenched from the rain by the time he reaches it and puts Hank’s address into the console. It doesn’t bother him - he can just turn his temperature sensors down - but he does think, perhaps a little wildly, that he isn’t going to be able to crawl into Hank’s bed like this without getting his sheets wet and making Hank cold, that he’s going to have to borrow Hank’s clothes, or strip down entirely... 

When he gets to Hank’s house, Connor finds the key under the planter outside the front door, and he lets himself inside.

It’s dark, just the hallway light on. Sumo is in the living room, and he gives a warning growl until Connor says, “Shh. Hi, Sumo. Remember me?” 

Sumo stops growling and gets up, ambling over to greet Connor, nosing under his hand.

“Hi,” Connor whispers again. “Go lie down, okay? It’s still bedtime.”

Connor shrugs out of his jacket and hangs it on Hank’s coat stand to dry, and he kicks his shoes off by the door so he won’t get Hank’s floor dirty. When Sumo has returned to his bed - he has his stuffed lamb toy there with him, Connor realizes with a smile - Connor ducks down the hall and quietly slips into Hank’s bedroom.

Hank is still asleep, lying on his back, so Connor unbuttons his shirt and drops it from his shoulders, and he pushes his jeans down to the floor and steps out of them, until he’s only wearing his socks and his dark briefs.

He slips between the covers, putting a gentle hand on Hank’s chest so he won’t startle him, and he kisses him because he can’t help himself, because Hank stirring and starting to respond to him is something fascinating that Connor will never be able to replicate with his own stasis cycles. He’s asleep, or he’s awake - there is no in between.

“Connor?” Hank says when they part. “What are you...” 

“I don’t know,” Connor whispers. “Is this okay? I think I just wanted to kiss you.”

“Yeah,” Hank says quickly. “Yeah, of course it’s okay. You didn’t break a window, did you?”

“No. There’s a key under the planter,” Connor says primly, as if he’s always known that, and Hank grins and wraps an arm around him to kiss him again.

“I’m not being forward. Just so you know,” Connor says against his mouth as Hank touches bare skin. “My clothes got wet in the rain.”

Hank raises an eyebrow. “Hm. Are you being a little forward, though?” 

The corner of Connor’s mouth lifts. “Well, you got yours, Hank. Fair’s fair, isn’t it?”

Hank laughs, reaching between Connor’s legs and palming his cock when he finds him hard and waiting. Connor kisses him again, moans into it.

“How does this go again?” Hank asks wryly. “You fuck me and get me off so I last longer the second time, and then I fuck you?”

Connor smiles. “That’s what I’ve been thinking about, anyway.”

“Sounds like a long haul, baby.”

“We can do anything...”

Hank waves him off and reaches for his phone. When Connor looks over his shoulder, he’s scheduling his coffeemaker to start in an hour.

“You’ve put a lot of thought into this. I’ll just put coffee on for later so I don’t pass out at work today.”

“Hank,” Connor says, “if you want to go back to sleep, I’m okay with that, too. I like sleeping with you.” 

“You know,” Hank laughs, “I really fucking don’t.”

Connor is grinning so hard that it almost hurts when he tangles his fingers in Hank’s hair and kisses him again.

“I want to look at you,” he whispers a few moments later, when he has to retrieve his tongue from Hank’s mouth long enough that Hank can breathe. He occupies himself with kissing the hinge of Hank’s jaw and the line of his beard in the meantime, humming happily. 

“You’ve done a fuck ton of looking tonight,” Hank says. He’s out of breath, and Connor loves that. “You know that, right?”

Connor puts on his fake pout. “Am I not allowed?”

“I mean,” Hank says, “it just seems unfair. I haven’t done any.” 

Connor smiles, presses Hank onto his back and follows after him, and he likes that, too, how willingly Hank goes. “Here,” he says as he climbs astride Hank’s hips, “I’ll go where you can see me.” He rocks down against him and watches as Hank bites his bottom lip around a groan. Connor catches him by the chin and kisses him, tugging at the collar of Hank’s shirt. “Take this off for me?”

He wonders if Hank will protest, but he doesn’t, and Connor feels his heart swell at that, because he knows Hank doesn’t like the way he looks, but he trusts Connor enough to give it to him anyway.

And Connor thinks he’s beautiful, and so fucking fascinating - Connor could get a tattoo, if he wanted, or the android equivalent of one, but his would never fade the way Hank’s has. His body will never collect fat deposits or stretch marks or scars - it will never be anything other than what it was designed to be.

Connor puts a hand on Hank’s sternum and runs his fingers through the grey hair on his chest. Hank grasps his thighs, fingerprints pressing into his synth-skin, and Connor feels so overwhelmed and so distracted by all this new data that he has to grasp Hank by the wrists and pull his hands away.

“Don’t touch me,” he says softly, pressing Hank’s wrists into his pillow pointedly. He kisses the inside of one of them as he maneuvers him. “You’re distracting, and I don’t want you to distract me.”

“Ooh,” Hank breathes, a touch mocking but all good-natured. “Is this the part in your little preconstructions where you cuff me? Because I don’t bring them home from work...”

“Of course you don’t,” Connor says primly. “They’re in your equipment locker. But you do have these...” And Connor likes it, the way Hank flushes when he reaches for the middle drawer of his nightstand, pulling another pair of handcuffs out and dangling them from a finger. “They aren’t police issue, of course...it looks like you bought them from some sex shop...but I imagine they’ll get the job done.”

Hank swallows thickly. “How did you know those were there?”

“You were out cold the first night I was here,” Connor says, and then he drops forward to kiss Hank and whisper against his mouth, “and I’m very nosy by nature.” He feigns innocence, a touch of surprise. “Did you think we were talking about your DPD cuffs this whole time?”

“Yeah,” Hank says dryly. “I forgot for a second how creepy you are.”

Connor smiles like it’s the sweetest compliment - and from Hank, it might as well be - before he pops one of the cuffs open and drags the cool metal over Hank’s body - over one peaked nipple, and up his arm, grazing his wrist. “Is this okay?” he asks when he leans down to kiss Hank again.

“You going to let me touch you later?”

Connor nods, his forehead brushing Hank’s. “I’m going to let you do whatever you want to me. But I’m impatient, so I get to go first.”

“Well, hey, you found them,” Hank says. “Go on, then”

It’s as fascinating as Connor thought it would be, fastening the cuffs around Hank’s wrist, fishing it through the slats of the headboard to bind the other one.

He could think very hard, if he wanted to, about why he likes this.

(He was designed to serve a purpose, to be subservient, and so he likes being in control, because he has been so infrequently, but more than that he likes the willing surrender from one of the people he was designed to serve and be a tool for. He likes that Hank trusts him. He likes the partnership in this. 

More than anything, though, he likes that Hank is willing to let him take care of him. 

He likes that he gets to take care of him.)

“Hey,” Hank says softly as Connor sits back and looks at him, brushing a thumb over his nipple to watch it tighten. “You’re red, baby.” 

Connor reaches up and touches his temple. He left his apartment so quickly that he forgot to gouge his LED out. “It’s just a lot. You’re a lot,” he says. “Do you want me to take it out quick? It’s going to be red most of tonight, and that isn’t bad, but it can be distracting for people...” 

The chain of the handcuffs snap softly against the headboard, and Connor realizes Hank is instinctively trying to reach for him. When he remembers he can’t, he settles for simply shifting his hips under Connor enough to jostle him, the best he can do for some contact between them.

“Leave it in,” Hank says when Connor looks at him. “If you want to. I want to see it.”

Connor leans over him and kisses him, smiling when he hears the soft snap of the chain against the headboard again. “You can’t help yourself, can you?” 

“From trying to touch you?” Hank asks without any pretense. Connor likes that, how little he cares about appearances. “I...fuck,” he trails off when Connor latches onto his neck, sucking his skin between his teeth. “Fuck, honey...if you put a hickey somewhere where I have to explain it at work tomorrow, I fucking swear...”

“I’m not _mean_ , Hank,” Connor says indignantly before he returns to work. He stays there, suckling Hank’s skin until Hank is writhing under him, rocking his hips so his cock occasionally grazes Connor’s. 

“That as interesting to you as you thought it would be?” Hank asks when Connor pulls back to study the mark forming, brushing his fingers over it.

“I don’t bruise or get otherwise marked up in any way, so...yes.”

“Shame,” Hank says. 

There’s a hot flare low in Connor’s belly at the implication that Hank wants him to. “I could simulate it, if you’d like me to”

“Hey.” Hank tries to reach for Connor, and Connor takes pity on him and takes his hand, fitting their fingers together. “I don’t want you to simulate anything unnatural for my benefit, okay?” 

Connor is more than willing to simulate whatever Hank likes. He’s designed that way - malleable, adaptable, meant, like all androids, to be what humans want and need.

Connor wishes he had known when he was in R&D, when he was being upgraded and redesigned to be better, when he was in the field as a prototype whose experiences and performance would be used to craft the final product, that someday someone would think he was enough the way he is.

“Okay,” he whispers. “No one has ever wanted me the way I am before.” 

“People are fucking idiots, baby,” Hank says, and Connor laughs and feels his thirium pump clench in his chest, because he loves him so much it hurts.

Connor kisses him again and then slips down Hank’s body to work his boxers over his hips, breath catching as his cock bobs free. He wraps his hand around it, feels the weight of it, thick and heavy, in his palm as Hank sucks in a breath. Connor gives it an experimental stroke, watching the way Hank shifts and moves with it, endlessly fascinated.

Connor shifts enough that he can reach the nightstand again, pulling the lube from the same drawer where he found the handcuffs while Hank watches him. “You find that too when you were snooping around?” he asks.

“I prefer ‘investigating’,” Connor says, dragging his hand down Hank’s shaft so he can watch his head drop back and listen to the little groan he lets out in response. He holds the lube up for Hank to see. “And this is actually what I was looking for in the first place.”

“Lube,” Hank repeats dryly, and Connor gives him a deadpan look.

“I wanted to buy some if you didn’t have any here.” Hank stares at him as Connor slicks his fingers, a bit incredulous, so Connor adds, “I like to be prepared, Hank.”

“Right. But you don’t need that at all, do you? You make your own, or whatever.”

Connor nudges Hank’s legs open and reaches between them, ghosting his fingers between the cleft of his ass and over his hole. “Aw. Were you doing more research?”

“Yeah, shut up,” he says, voice tight as Connor presses more firmly against his rim.

Connor looks up at him from between his legs, a small smile on his face. “What’s your point, Hank?”

“Oh,” Hank says softly. “You just. Knew I was going to put out eventually?”

“I’m very persuasive when I want to be,” Connor tells him. He leans over Hank to kiss him as he presses a finger into him. He’s tight, and hot, and Hank groans into his mouth. “And I’m perceptive, too,” Connor whispers when they part and he leans his forehead against Hank’s, as he pulls his finger back and pushes in again. “I told you the first time I met you that you were going to like me.”

It doesn't surprise Connor that he needs to slow some of his sensory data processors down manually - he knew he would, at least if he didn't want to let himself be overwhelmed too quickly, while he's still trying to control the situation. 

It _does_ surprise him that he has to do it now, when he hasn't even finished fingering Hank open. It's early for him to be thinking that he might not be able to keep his focus.

(And he will let himself lose his focus soon, but not right now.) 

Connor keeps his forehead braced against Hank's and presses a second finger inside him - the heat of it is dulled now, at least as he perceives it, but he still feels his synth-skin pulling back on his fingers in response to it.

"You're tight," Connor whispers as he slowly spreads his fingers inside Hank's hole.

"It's been a while," Hank says, and Connor grasps the back of his neck and kisses his brow where it's knit together in concentration. He crooks his fingers inside him, squeezes Hank's neck when he drops his head back. 

Minutes stretch on like that, and Connor relishes the way Hank steadily falls apart - breathing elevated, handcuffs catching on the headboard, bucking his hips in some increasingly desperate quest for friction.

He tries to tell Connor he's ready twice before Connor pulls his fingers free, laying his hand on Hank's hip and lovingly tracing his thumb over one of the stretch marks there.

"You good?" he asks, and Hank rolls his eyes with a small smile.

"I have been. You're not that big."

"Fair," Connor says. He takes Hank's cock in hand and strokes it firmly. "Something like this wouldn't have looked right on me," he adds practically, and he takes him in his mouth because he can, because he told Hank he could swallow him all the way down and he wants to prove it, because he wants to hear the chain snap against the headboard again. He doesn't get the full rush of sensory data from his analysis components with his settings adjusted, but it's enough, and he thinks with some considerable delight that he can do this again tomorrow morning, and the next day, and the next...

"Baby," Hank grits out, and it sounds like begging. It sounds _beautiful_.

Connor takes pity on him, mostly because for as much as he likes torturing Hank, he's that much more impatient. He pulls off of Hank's cock and brushes his hair back from his forehead, kissing him and whispering, "Okay."

He pushes his own underwear down, and he kisses the curve of Hank's bent knee as he settles between his thighs, reaching for Hank's hand and lacing their fingers together.

Hank squeezes his hand, and Connor listens to his breath in his ear as he lines up with Hank’s hole and sinks into him.

Connor can, and has, run detailed preconstructions of this moment, with realistic sensory relays standing in for the real thing, but none of that prepares him for the rest of it, for the way he can hear Hank’s breath and Hank’s heart. None of it stops him from having to drop his forehead to the crook of Hank’s neck to collect himself for a moment.

Hank can’t touch him, so he turns and noses into Connor’s hair instead. “You okay?” he asks softly.

Connor kisses the skin under his ear. “I cost millions of dollars to build,” he whispers, “with the fastest processors in any android to date. And I can’t think straight, even with my sensors turned down. Because of you.”

“Aw,” Hank breathes wryly, and Connor takes his face in his hands and kisses him as he pulls out and rocks back in. 

“That’s cheating, you know,” Hank says a moment later, against Connor’s mouth where they aren’t exactly kissing, just staying close and breathing the same air.

“What is?” Connor asks. He thrusts into Hank more forcefully, listening to the way it forces the breath out of him. 

“Fuck,” Hank says in a ghosting whisper, and Connor feels so fucking proud. “Turning down your sensors,” he says when he collects himself. “That’s cheating.”

Connor drops down to him and pushes his fingers through Hank’s hair. “I’m not coming until you do,” he whispers, “and I want to be clear-headed when you do. I want to watch you.” 

And then Connor has an idea then that he likes very much, so much that he pulls back, pulls out entirely, ignoring the way Hank snaps the chain of the handcuffs against the headboard in protest. 

“Wait,” Connor says quickly, kissing him quiet. “I want to try something. So I can see you better.”

Hank doesn’t argue when Connor unfastens one of his cuffs and pulls him free of the headboard, although he binds his wrists again in front of his body when Hank tries to reach for his face.

“You’re still not allowed to touch me,” Connor says as he does, and Hank rolls his eyes.

“You going to spank me if I do?”

“Yes,” Connor replies, entirely deadpan. He doesn’t know if he’s joking or not.

(Probably not.)

Connor sits back against the headboard and tries to pull Hank into his lap, although there’s some resistance when he does. “I’m going to crush you,” Hank says when Connor raises an eyebrow, which is an entirely unfounded concern.

“You can’t hurt me,” Connor says. He grasps Hank by the chin and pulls him in to kiss him. “I want you like this so I can look over your shoulder and watch you touching yourself for me while I fuck you. Can you do that?”

“Fuck,” Hank mutters. “Yeah, fine, but I’m heavy.”

“I’m stronger than I look,” Connor says, and that’s the end of it. He pulls Hank into his lap, pulls him back so Hank’s back is flush against his chest. He ruts into the cleft of Hank’s ass for a few strokes before sinks into him again. Hank’s head drops back onto Connor’s shoulder and Connor kisses him messily when it does. 

He likes this better, he decides immediately, if only for the angle, because he can look over Hank’s shoulder and watch himself playing with a peaked nipple, because he can see the line of Hank’s belly and the way his cock curves up against it. He doesn’t have as much range to thrust into him freely like this, but he’s balls deep in the heat of him, and he can rock into him enough to get the groans out of him that he’s quickly becoming attached to.

“I could look at you like this forever,” Connor whispers in his ear with little exaggeration. He kisses Hank’s temple, grazes his teeth over his hairline. “Touch yourself for me. I want to watch you come.”

Hank has enough range of movement with the handcuffs that he can wrap a hand around himself and stroke himself in time with Connor rocking into him. Connor watches over Hank’s shoulder and bites Hank’s neck, forgetting entirely that he isn’t supposed to leave a mark where anyone can see.

Connor watches it carefully, the way Hank grips himself tighter at the base of his cock, the pace he sets with his hand, listens to the way Hank’s heart rate picks up and his breathing catches. Connor wraps an arm around Hank’s stomach, drags him down more firmly onto his cock as he gets closer, and he presses his forehead to Hank’s as he squeezes his eyes shut. He can mute the sensory relays, but he can do nothing to disable the way watching Hank makes him feel.

And in the end, Connor is greedy, because he can be, because this is his, and he’s allowed.

He reaches down and places his hand over Hank’s, wrapped around his cock, to stroke along with him. Hank groans against his mouth, and the muscles in his back tense where they’re pressed to Connor’s chest, and Connor turns his head far enough to watch Hank come over his belly in spurts.

He’s thinking about running his finger through it and tasting it when Hank brings his cuffed hands to Connor’s face so he can grip his chin.

“Turn your settings back up, baby,” he says softly. “Stop cheating.”

Connor drops his forehead to Hank’s shoulder and gasps when Hank leans his head back far enough to nip at his earlobe. “I’m going to come if I do,” he whispers, and he doesn’t want that, not yet. This is still the part where he’s supposed to be in control. He wants to take care of Hank still. He wants to be good. 

Hank chuckles in his ear, a low sound that sends a shot of warmth through Connor’s body. “Then come,” he says.

Connor looks at him, into his eyes and at his kiss-reddened lips and at the curve of his belly and the mess of come and sweat painting it, and he doesn’t like being told what to do, usually, especially with his settings (it feels too familiar), and he likes doing what he’s told even less. But in this moment, he does, because it’s different when it’s Hank asking.

He turns brings his sensory processors back up to normal speed, feels the slick, tight heat he’s still buried in, and Hank’s skin against his chest, and Hank’s fingers on his cheek.

And he comes harder than he thinks he ever has in his life, sinking his teeth into Hank’s shoulder to muffle the pitiful, needy cry that comes with spilling into him. 

Hank grips his hair with a hand fisted there, pulling gently while he does, and Connor realizes all at once that he likes that. “There,” Hank whispers against his temple as Connor sags under him. He twists enough that he can touch Connor’s face. “You were so good, honey. So good. Holy fuck.”

Connor smiles sleepily and kisses Hank’s shoulder again before he shifts him out of his lap, groaning when he slips from his hole. Hank lies back against his pillow, and Connor reaches over him to retrieve the handcuff key from the nightstand.

“You’re a good sport,” he says, kissing the corner of Hank’s mouth as he unfastens them.

Hank snorts at that. “Maybe I’m just trying to earn some good karma so I can use these on you sometime.”

Connor picks the handcuffs up and gives them an experimental snap. “I could break these.”

“Of course you could.” Hank’s mouth pulls up into a smile. “But you wouldn’t, would you?”

Connor smiles and curls up against him, resting his forehead in the crook of Hank’s neck. “No,” he says softly. “I can be good for you.” Hank raises a pointed eyebrow, and Connor smiles and adds, “Mostly.”

Hank laughs and kisses his forehead. “You still want round two?”

Connor does, very much, but he knows they’re built differently. “Not if you’re tired.”

“I’m not tired.” Hank drags his fingers through Connor’s hair. “I just need some time to collect myself.”

Connor’s body feels like it’s thrumming with electricity, alive with the spark of it, but he can wait. “Okay,” he whispers.

He doesn’t expect Hank to grasp the back of his neck, to squeeze gently and then press his finger against the hinge of the panel covering Connor’s access port. He looks up to find Hank watching him with dark eyes.

“You want me to fuck around with your wires a while?” he asks, and Connor shudders and kisses him hard, nodding against him. 

“I think you already know how to open it,” he says, and he feels Hank’s smile against his lips as he presses down hard enough to push the panel back.

“Look at me, baby,” he whispers, and when Connor does, he dips his fingers inside.

Connor has the presence of mind to think that he’s surprised by Hank’s commitment to all of this. He expected some uncertainty, to need to convince him...he expected that Hank might think Connor thought a physical relationship between them was part of his job and resist it on principle. 

It occurs to him that maybe some switch flipped for Hank tonight, too, the same switch that brought Connor here in the middle of the night in the first place.

It’s the last thing he thinks before he feels Hank’s fingers slipping between the wires in his neck, pushing through them, and the HUD warning for a foreign body in his chassis flares.

His processors slow, and everything narrows to the point where Hank is inside him, every one of his systems focused in on it. It’s a defense response to the intrusion, but it feels like the best high that comes with lighting a cigarette and breathing in, forcing everything in him to stop, to relax...

Connor looks into Hank’s eyes, and he doesn’t hear Sumo snoring in the living room or the car passing outside, doesn’t scan or see anything else in the room beyond how blue they are. A single focal point.

“Hank...” he whispers, and he doesn’t even know what he’s trying to say, but Hank smiles like he understands anyway in the moment before he wraps a wire around his finger and gently tugs. 

Connor moans and he doesn’t quite sound human, a metallic overtone to it. His internal temperature is already elevated, but he feels it rising further. Hank puts a hand on his cheek and kisses his forehead, and then he does it again, not hard enough to dislodge the wire, but enough that Connor feels the edge of danger in it.

“You’re running hot, baby,” Hank whispers into his hair when Connor folds into his chest, panting against his skin.

Connor tries to think of some response, something cute or witty, but nothing comes. Hank’s fingers feel massive inside his neck port, and the HUD warning is flaring, and Hank’s eyes are so blue, and Connor can’t think.

For once, he can’t think.

He feels Hank tracing the ridges of the metal skeleton that Connor is built around, that serves as his bones, and maybe he would marvel at how deep inside his port Hank is if he could only think that far.

Instead, he fists his hand against Hank’s chest, grasps a fistful of skin almost certainly hard enough to bruise, and tries to hang on as Hank tugs on something that makes his vision short out for a moment.

Connor tries to say Hank’s name, but all that comes out is a garbled noise, half moan and half static, but maybe Hank understands, because Connor feels something on his lower lip and opens his mouth to feel Hank pressing his fingers inside. 

And he comes again, because his systems are overloaded, and that’s the only thing his body can do, spilling where his untouched cock rests against Hank’s hip. He’s hot enough inside that Hank has to pull his fingers back from his port - although Connor bites down on the ones in his mouth before Hank can withdraw those, too. He laves his tongue over the pads of Hank’s fingers, even if his systems are running too sluggishly to properly analyze the trace elements on them. It’s enough to feel the lines of Hank’s fingerprints on his tongue.

Connor does eventually release them, but not until several minutes pass. Hank strokes a thumb over his cheek when Connor tucks his head to Hank’s chest with a sleepy smile.

“There are access ports everywhere,” he mumbles, “to reach every biocomponent. You could touch my heart, if you wanted to. Or anything else.”

Hank snorts. “That hardly sounds safe.”

“I trust you,” Connor whispers. “It’s supposed to feel good.”

Hank touches the rim of Connor’s neck port, still open, with his finger and watches Connor shudder against him. “You want to leave this open for me?” 

Connor swallows thickly and nods against him. “Okay,” he whispers, and he shivers with the promise of it when Hank traces his fingers over the wires there, the lightest touch, like a gentle kiss.

Hank is half-hard again where his cock is resting against his thick thigh, and Connor reaches out, meaning to stroke him to fullness or maybe take him in his mouth, when Hank catches him by the wrist.

“Uh uh,” he says, shaking his head. He presses Connor onto his back, and Connor could fight if he wanted to, but instead he goes willingly, sinking back against Hank’s pillow. “I get to look at you now.”

Connor would protest, try to goad Hank by telling him that he what he wants, more than to be looked at, is to be fucked into the mattress until he can feel the plating of his chassis creaking against the force of it, by reminding Hank that he promised he would fuck him like he deserves.

He bites his tongue, though, because it doesn’t take more than one moment beyond his head hitting the pillow to realize that he likes Hank looking at him. 

Hank looks at him like everyone else does in some ways, and like no one at all. He looks like he thinks Connor is pretty, but everyone does - Connor knows he’s attractive, after all. But no one ever looks at him like they want all of him - his nightmares and his smoking and all his fucking anxiety. Nobody wants the shit that isn’t pretty like he is.

He thinks Hank does, though. The attention means so much more because he thinks he does. It makes heat pool in his belly, makes him stretch fluidly and preen a little under Hank’s gaze. 

Hank puts a hand on Connor’s chest, over the ring of his thirium pump, and then he brushes a thumb over Connor’s nipple, making a pleased sound in the back of his throat when it pebbles in response.

Connor’s cock twitches where it lies, flushed and leaking, against his flat belly, and he shifts his hips, trying to hint at something.

“You should touch me,” he whispers when Hank doesn’t get the message, as he traces the metal circle on Connor’s chest instead.

Hank smirks at that. “I am touching you, baby.”

Connor pouts. “You know what I mean.” 

Hank bends to kiss him, gentle and slow. “Tell me what you want,” he whispers, and Connor huffs in frustration.

It’s fine. He can play this game. 

He reaches out and strokes his fingers through Hank’s beard, murmurs, “I want you to finger me,” into his mouth when he kisses him. 

It does get Hank’s breath to catch, although his resolve is stronger than that. “Patience, honey,” he says, and Connor rolls his eyes.

“I’m not patient.”

Hank wraps a hand around his cock, and Connor realizes that he can only see the flushed head of it peeking from Hank’s closed fist. It’s enough to make him almost short out again. He doesn’t, but there’s thirium-based lubricant leaking from him, and he has to bring a crooked finger to his mouth so he can bite down on it. 

Hank notices and doesn’t quite mask his self-satisfied smile as he reaches up and gently pries Connor’s finger from his mouth.

“You can be loud, baby,” he says, and then he gives him a slow, firm stroke to accentuate his point.

Connor drops his head back onto the pillow with a groan, and it isn’t loud, exactly, but it does come out of him unbidden, and that’s a remarkable thing on its own when everything he does is always calculated, when he’s always in control of himself... 

Hank lies over Connor, and he’s so much bigger than him, big enough to cover him and shield him and drown everything else out. He pushes Connor’s hair back from his forehead, and Connor hooks his knees over his hips, and he’s smiling, happily and stupidly, when he lifts his head to kiss him.

He can feel Hank’s cock against his, pressed between their bellies, and he rocks into it as Hank reaches between them, fingers ghosting between the cleft of Connor’s ass and over his hole.

“Fuck, you are wet,” he mutters in Connor’s ear. 

“Mhm.” Connor hums, nipping at the shell of Hank’s ear. “Or impatient. You know. Take your pick for what you want to call it.”

Hank kisses his forehead and says, “Don’t be a brat,” before he sits up far enough to press a finger inside, to look down at the slick skin as he does. Connor turns his face into the pillow, panting against the fabric, fingers twisted in the sheets as Hank slowly pulls his finger back and then pushes in again. His red LED is throwing shadows across the ceiling, casting the room in the faint glow of it. 

“Hank,” he whines in a thick voice, because words feel difficult right now, like they’re sticking in his throat. “Come on.”

“Okay, Jesus,” Hank says. “Fucking bossy.”

Connor is opening his mouth to reply to that, although Hank presses a second finger into him then, and he feels the biocomponent stretching, feels heady with it even if there’s no burn to it. That’s the point of the whole design - Hank could fuck him all night, as hard as he wants, and Connor would be able to take it.

He’s never been sure how he feels about that before.

The genital biocomponents weren’t designed with androids in mind at all, even if many of them have reclaimed them. There’s always a bit of guilt in the back of Connor’s mind that he got the upgrade at all, because it was designed to be used, and it wasn’t designed for him. 

It’s a complicated thing, trying to reclaim his own body, knowing he was built to be a tool and a weapon, trying to take ownership of himself, trying to rebel against what he was designed to be and being so desperate to be accepted for what he is, too. 

He’s never felt comfortable with what he wants or at home in his own skin, until now.

He pushes himself up, pushes Hank back against the footboard and climbs into his lap, kisses him and whispers, “Use me,” into his mouth, because that’s the rebellion, isn’t it, the “fuck you” to his makers, that he was designed to be used by anyone, and now Hank is the only one who can.

And there’s more to those words, too, use me, want me, choose me, (love me), and Connor doesn’t say it, but Hank looks at him like he knows.

"Come here," Hank says, an arm around Connor's waist, and Connor goes easily as Hank maneuvers him so he can drag his cock over Connor's hole, smearing the lubricant leaking from it over his ass in a tease Connor is far too impatient to appreciate. 

"Hank," he says, voice clipped, but Hank kisses him and sinks into him, and any frustration in him dissolves away like Hank's name fading into a moan on his lips.

They sit there like that for a long moment, chest to chest, Connor in Hank's lap, Connor clinging tight to Hank's shoulders, Hank peppering kiss after kiss over Connor's jaw.

He's so full. He's so full, and he forgot entirely that his neck port is still open until he feels Hank's fingers brush the rim of it. Connor whines, squirming in his lap as a shiver runs through him. 

"I'm going to come again if you do that," he whispers, and Hank has the audacity to laugh.

"So?" he asks, and Connor buries a hand in his hair and takes hold of it, pulling Hank's head back so he can meet his eyes.

"I don't want to until you do." 

"Then fuck yourself down on me, baby," Hank says, and Connor remembers all at once that he can move, that he's still the one in control here. He rocks his hips once experimentally and moans softly at the drag of Hank's cock inside of him. 

Hank watches him, reverent, and Connor kisses him to catch every noise he makes like they're something precious to be collected. Hank's skin is hot where Connor's cock is pressed between the two of them, burning him, and there's Hank's sweat and Connor's lubricant and both of their come all over both of them, and Connor doesn't even care as he works himself down, grinding down in Hank's lap, because he's not human enough to be troubled by the mess of it, and he thinks the mix of the two of them is terribly interesting... 

"Fuck, baby," Hank whispers against him. "You're so good, sweetheart. Fuck, you feel so good..."

It's hardwired into him, maybe, buried in his code, but Connor chases praise like a bloodhound and works harder for it every time. He snaps his hips against Hank's, hard and desperate, basking in every sound it earns him from Hank's mouth, panting harshly against Hank's ear...

"Connor," Hank chokes out. "Fuck, honey, I'm...do you want me to pull out?"

And maybe Connor should be embarrassed by the way he clings to him, by the fact that in that moment Hank couldn't move even if he wanted to, or by the desperate way he whispers, "Please come inside me," in Hank's ear, but Hank gathers him up with his arms tight around Connor's waist, holds him close like he's trying to keep him safe and hauls him down on his cock twice more while Connor kisses him hungrily.

When Connor feels warmth flooding inside him, Hank pushes his fingers hard into Connor's neck port, wires parting around him as he presses in deep enough to touch Connor's spine, and Connor comes, shaking, with a strangled yell, warnings flaring in his HUD and he loses focus on everything else but this.

He says Hank's name without realizing he's saying it, crumpled against him while Hank holds him and strokes a hand over his back and through his hair, petting him everywhere he can reach. 

Hank says something in his ear that Connor can't properly hear through the static fuzz around him. "Hm?" he breathes softly, folding into Hank and resting his cheek on his shoulder.

"I asked if you're okay," Hank says. Connor still feels sluggish, but he hears it this time. 

"'m okay," he whispers, surprised to find that it comes out slurred.

"I'm going to close this, okay?" Hank asks, and Connor nods when he feels his fingers at his neck port, sliding the panel back into place. 

Connor isn't thinking clearly - or maybe he's thinking too clearly and just doesn't have the capacity to stop himself right now - because the next thing he says as he sags against Hank is, "I don't want you to pay me anymore." 

Hank strokes his back and says, jokingly, "I can’t tell if you’re asking me out or breaking up with me."

"I'm asking you out."

Hank sighs and maneuvers them, laying Connor back against one of his pillows and lying down beside him. "You need me to pay you, baby," he says, taking Connor's hand and threading their fingers together.

Connor squeezes his hand. "I could take on another client to replace you. It's just work. It doesn't mean anything."

"I know," Hank says quickly. Connor lies there and watches him think, content to wait. "What if I give you four hundred dollars a week, just lump sum as a gift..."

"Hank. That's more than what you pay me now..."

"...and you drop a client and spend another night a week with me instead?"

Connor blinks, considering it a moment before he smiles. "Okay," he whispers. "Deal."

“Okay. Good.” Hank runs his fingers through Connor’s hair, brushing his thumb over his LED as it settles to a calm blue. “We need a shower. We’re really fucking gross.”

Connor catches Hank by the wrist to hold him there, even though he hasn’t moved. “Can you hold me for a few minutes first?”

“God, you’re cute,” Hank says, voice soft. “Yeah. Come here, sweetheart.” He folds an arm around Connor’s shoulders, pulling him into his chest and tucking Connor’s head under his chin.

Connor presses his forehead into the crook of Hank’s neck so he can listen to his pulse steadying there. “I told you I would be your boyfriend if you wanted me to be,” he whispers, closing his eyes as Hank laughs and strokes his fingers through his hair.

“Yeah. I guess you did.”

“I’ve never had a boyfriend before.” 

Hank sighs, and Connor can feel his breath in his hair. “I’m not sure how great of a first I am...”

“Hey. No self-deprecation. That’s still the rule.” Connor shifts so he can kiss him. “I think you’re a good first, anyway.”

Hank is quiet for a moment, idly running his fingers through Connor’s hair, and then he says, “Huh,” like he’s suddenly realized something. Connor moves so he can look at him, and Hank shrugs and says, “No, it’s just...there were plenty of hookups, but I’ve never _technically_ had a boyfriend before, either.” 

Connor grins and kisses him, and he feels like he might overload his processors with nothing other than his own sheer happiness.

“Hank?” he says when he settles back against Hank’s chest.

“Hmm?”

Connor runs his fingers through the hair on Hank’s chest, using the texture to ground and center himself. “I’ve never loved anyone before, either.”

And everything goes very still around them for just a moment while Connor listens to his words echo back to him and wonders if they’re silly. “I’m sorry,” he whispers. “I know it’s early to say it...I just think it’s true.”

“It’s okay,” Hank says quickly. “I think sometimes you just know.” He kisses Connor’s hair and whispers, “I love you, too.”

Connor thinks his systems might short-circuit trying to understand the intense joy he’s feeling when it’s all so new, that he might black out right here and be offline for hours.

He doesn’t. But he _might_ , and that alone is something. 

“No one else ever has,” Connor whispers into Hank’s chest, and Hank squeezes the back of his neck.

“Well, like I said. People are fucking idiots,” he says. “Come on. We can cuddle after we’re clean.”

“I don’t mind,” Connor pouts.

Hank laughs at that. “You’re so gross,” he says. And Connor doesn’t quite know how, but it sounds like “I love you” all over again.

He watches Hank get up and root through the clothes in his dresser before something occurs to him and he turns back to look at Connor. “You can shower, right?” 

“Only if you put me in rice afterwards,” Connor says dryly. “Yes, Hank. Of course I can shower.”

Hank rolls his eyes at the sarcasm, although Connor sees him stifling a smile, too. “Cool,” he says. “Come on, then.”

The incredible thing, Connor thinks as he sits up and realizes his limbs feel heavy, is that he’s actually tired. He’s never been tired before, never felt like he _needed_ stasis to recharge before, but it’s a night of firsts, he supposes. 

He gets up and follows Hank anyway, and under the brighter lights in the bathroom, he can more clearly see the dark marks starting to deepen on Hank’s skin in the wake of him, on his neck where Connor bit him and on his chest where he grabbed him. 

“I think you’re _maybe_ the roughest fuck I’ve ever had,” Hank says as he starts the water and prods one of the bruises in the mirror while he waits to it to heat. “Definitely the messiest.”

“Sorry,” Connor says, sheepish.

Hank glances at him over his shoulder, a small smile on his face. “That wasn’t a criticism, baby.”

The corner of Connor’s mouth lifts. “I can be rougher next time. If you want me to be.”

Hank laughs and pushes him towards the shower. “Slow down, slick. I haven’t even caught my breath from this time yet.” 

“Your breathing patterns normalized thirteen minutes...” Connor starts as he climbs into the shower, just to give Hank shit, but Hank kisses him quiet before he can get the words out.

Connor behaves in the shower. Hank doesn’t, mostly because he has the water running hot enough to make Connor’s synth-skin recede for the briefest moment when it hits him, and Hank thinks that’s terribly pretty.

(Connor knows because he tells him so, over and over again as he kisses the little speckles of white as they appear and disappear.)

It’s 6:30 in the morning by the time they’re getting ready for bed. Hank gives Connor some clothes to borrow, an old t-shirt with a band name on it that Connor immediately runs a search on (“This seems like loud noise,” he tells Hank when he does, which earns him a scowl in return) and sweatpants that only stay up because of the drawstring.

The buzzer for the coffee Hank scheduled to brew goes off, and as he goes out to the kitchen to take the pot off, Connor changes the sheets and tosses the dirty ones in the general direction of what looks to be Hank’s terribly disorganized laundry pile. 

Hank’s voice is echoing softly from the kitchen, and Connor thinks at first as he climbs into bed that he’s talking to Sumo, but he realizes after he listens for a moment that he’s calling off work for the day. He hears him pouring the coffee down the sink as he does.

Connor smiles and nestles himself deeper under Hank’s covers. Without giving it much thought at all, he texts the client he’s supposed to meet later that afternoon. He says he needs to go in for unexpected maintenance, and by the time Hank returns to the bedroom and gets into bed beside him, both of their schedules are clear.

Hank wraps an arm around him and pulls him in close, and Connor hums when he kisses the back of his neck.

“Your alarm for later this morning is disabled,” Connor says softly. “Just so you know, in case you wanted to turn it on.”

“Yeah,” Hank says, voice thick and tired. “I know. We’re sleeping in.”

Connor smiles and sinks back into him, into the warmth radiating from him and all the happiness he feels, and whispers, “Okay.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I commissioned some art of the sex scene in this chapter from [Mao](https://twitter.com/chococo_mao), who absolutely fucking crushed it - I'm so in love with the finished piece! You can see that art [here!](https://twitter.com/chococo_mao/status/1213269333993906177)
> 
> As you may know from the previous chapter notes, this fic is being updated daily as a thread on Twitter and then uploaded in chapters to AO3 as I go, so if you're enjoying this and you don't want to wait for the next chapter, you can pick up the thread where this chapter leaves off on Twitter [here!](https://twitter.com/Jolli_Bean/status/1213714459899965440)
> 
> Speaking of Twitter, I'm VERY active over there - you can follow me [here!](http://twitter.com/Jolli_Bean) You can also catch me occasionally reblogging HankCon art on [tumblr.](http://jolli-bean.tumblr.com) Come chat with me!


	3. the one that goes forever

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So the days pass, and then Hank and Connor's first week together, and their second. And they date.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title from Mutual Benefit's "Sinking Stone":
> 
> _Like how we tried to skip a sinking stone  
>  Just to watch how long that it could go  
> I'm so afraid to fall in love again  
> I know how it ends_
> 
> _But if I try and skip a sinking stone  
>  Maybe it'll be the one that goes  
> Forever as it starts its flight  
> Towards the horizon line_

When Hank wakes up and checks his phone, it’s almost 1 pm. 

There’s the usual angry message from Jeff on his phone telling him he needs to stop calling off so much and that he’s on “thin fucking ice” - an empty threat at this point. His hip aches and his back hurts, but not in an entirely unpleasant way, more like the affirming discomfort that comes with a good workout (or with having the best sex of his life).

And Connor is asleep beside him, his head on Hank’s chest, an arm wrapped tight around him, Hank’s t-shirt hanging off his shoulder. Hank thinks - rather wildly, considering that he hasn’t fucked anyone in years and the whiskey has messed with his dick enough that he sometimes can’t get it up to jerk off out of boredom - about rolling Connor over onto his back and kissing the delicate line of his collarbone and going for round...well, fuck, round four if he counts the phone sex that started everything last night (and Hank is _absolutely_ counting it).

He doesn’t do that, because he misses Connor and he wants to wake him up but he wants to watch his gorgeous, peaceful face even more, and because he very genuinely doesn’t think he has anything else in him, that it’s going to take him a day or two to recover from Connor fucking him absolutely senseless.

But, fuck. He thinks about it. 

Instead, Hank wraps both of his arms around Connor, enveloping him, and he watches him sleep, and he thinks of Connor timidly saying, “I’ve never loved anyone before,” and he basks in how fucking lucky he feels.

He met Connor two weeks ago, and now he can’t imagine being without him. It’s been a rare few times in his life that he’s been able to hold something this precious, and he always seems to lose what he loves, but he’s determined to keep this for as long as he can, even if it isn’t forever.

Connor wakes up a few minutes before two in the afternoon, just as Hank is feeling grateful that he had the presence of mind to let Sumo outside while he dumped his coffee down the sink earlier that morning. 

“Hey, baby,” Hank says when Connor blinks awake, and he loves the sleepy, happy smile it earns him so much it hurts. 

“Hi,” Connor says, tucking his forehead into Hank’s chest and kissing one of the bruises he left there. “You could have woken me up. It’s really late.”

“I told you we were sleeping in,” Hank says. “That’s the whole point.”

Connor nods against his chest. “I like sleeping with you,” he says softly. “It helps.”

So much happened last night since Connor first reached out to him that Hank forgot this all started because Connor texted him in the middle of the night, because he couldn’t stay in stasis...

Hank doesn’t ask about it - he just lies there and runs his fingers through Connor’s hair. But Connor, as usual, is pretty forthcoming with him, and it isn’t more than a few minutes before he says, “I have really bad...sort of like the equivalent of nightmares for you, I guess. Sometimes.”

“Nightmares,” Hank repeats. “About what?” 

Connor shudders against him. “About CyberLife, and the ways I disappointed the people who developed me...all my failures, no matter the size. It’s a passive mental function designed to help me improve my performance, but...” He shrugs and gives Hank a weak smile. “I don’t like how my brain works, either. It’s too loud sometimes. It’s why I like smoking. I need something to focus on to quiet myself down.” Connor squeezes Hank’s hand. “It’s why I like you, too. It’s hard to think about anything else when I’m with you.” 

Connor sighs and says, “I kept dreaming about dying last night. About how the first two marks dies, but I feel it like it happened to me, even if it didn’t. That’s why I couldn’t sleep.”

“Jesus,” Hank whispers, and he holds Connor closer and brushes his fingers through his hair. They've slept half the day away and should get up, probably, but they also don't have anywhere to be, and this feels...special.

It feels _special_.

So he looks at Connor and says, "Do you want to talk about it?" 

Connor nods against him. A moment passes, and then he whispers, "I don't know where to start."

"Anywhere you want, honey."

Connor nods again, and then he says, "The first one - mark 51 - fell from the roof of an apartment complex saving a human girl from the family's deviant housekeeper model. They were planning to replace him, and the stress response to being traded in broke his programming. Everyone thought he was afraid to die and that was why he did it, but he just loved that girl - he thought they were friends, and the idea that it wasn't real broke him. 

“I - mark 51, I mean - had to interfere physically, and there wasn't any way to pull the girl back without pushing the android from the building...and there wasn't any way to do it safely without going with him. It didn't happen to this body, but I feel it like it did. The fall...I remember that I wasn't afraid while I fell. The girl was safe, so...mission accomplished. I wasn't afraid until CyberLife transferred my memories into a new body, and I realized that I lost things. There were empty spaces where memories should have been, and the body didn't feel like mine. I always thought dying wouldn't hurt me - I'd just come back in a new body, good as immortal, but I think...I'm that first Connor, and I'm not. Mark 51 died falling from the roof. What CyberLife told me...that was a lie. I'm a continuation of him, almost identical, but I'm not him, and that means I can die, too. 

"So, I tried to be better. So I wouldn't die again. I was assigned to Agent Perkins, and one of the first days I was with him, we tracked a pair of deviant androids to a squat downtown, and when they ran, I pursued them out to the highway. It was too dangerous to cross - there was too much traffic, mostly autonomous vehicles, going too fast - so when they jumped the fence, I wasn't going to follow them. But Perkins pulled his gun on me, and he made me go. 

“I remember that, too...getting swiped by one of the cars, knocked off balance long enough that another knocked me down entirely, and then being crushed by the oncoming traffic. It...Mark 52's body didn't go offline right away. It hurt...I remember how badly it hurt. 

“That's why I didn't fight back, at Eden Club, when Perkins knocked me down and kicked me until my chassis cracked. I didn't trust him not to shoot me...and if he had, then I would be dead, too, and Mark 54 would have replaced me, and he would have been me and not me, the same way I have all of 51 and 52's memories but I'm not them...and I would just be dead the same way they are, and no one would even know I was gone, because they would just think I came in to work again the next day, no worse for the wear."

Connor tucks himself in closer to Hank. "So I laid there," he whispers. "And I took it. I _always_ had to lie there and take it. And now, because of the way they built me, I have to relive those things, because it was a failure, dying, and letting myself be damaged, and so I have to learn." 

Hank wishes he had known Connor during the revolution. If he had, he would have hit Perkins so much harder the day he punched him...but maybe it's a good thing he didn't.

If he had known any of this, even half of it, he isn't sure he would have stopped until the motherfucker was dead. 

He wraps an arm around Connor's shoulders and reaches for his cheek with his other hand, holding him as tightly as he can. "I'm so sorry," he says, because he doesn't know what else to say.

"It's okay," Connor whispers. "I wish I'd been assigned to you instead. They talked about sending me to the DPD, but then the FBI got involved in the case...those months were hard, and I wish I'd had someone good with me instead." He tilts his head to look at Hank. "I'm here now, though."

"Yeah," Hank says, voice soft. "You are."

He squeezes the back of Connor’s neck and Connor stretches against him, arching into him - Hank has decided he’s endlessly fascinated with discovering Connor’s reactions to being touched in different ways. He looks content when Hank glances down at his face, and it hurts a little, loving him now and thinking of the shit he might have said to him if he met him back in November.

“Maybe it’s better this way,” Hank says, thinking out loud. “Us meeting now, instead of then. I don’t think you would have liked me very much. _I_ didn’t like me very much.”

“I would have liked you,” Connor replies softly.

“I just...” Hank starts, although he has to cut off and try to find the words. “Look, I’m not proud of this shit, but an android operated on Cole when the surgeon was too high to do it. And then he died on the table, and I had to blame someone...I mean, I mostly blamed myself, but I blamed that android, too. And I didn’t heal right from that, so it just sort of...festered, I guess. Until I hated all of you. There was so much shit I didn’t know.” 

“You ended up on the roof with the snipers anyway,” Connor says. He shifts so he can put his hand on Hank’s cheek and look him full in the face. “I already told you I was down there. You saved my life...god, Hank, you’re so brave, and so good...I would have seen that. I would have liked you.”

Hank has never been so grateful for a drunken decision in all of his life. CyberLife could have brought Connor back if he had been shot that night, if they had been so inclined, but that would have been mark 54. This Connor - _his_ Connor - would be gone 

He has the medal of valor they presented to him somewhere stashed in his dresser, but receiving that didn’t feel anywhere near as good as holding Connor in this moment and feeling how alive he is.

Hank has always had complicated feelings about that night - he’s never been able to entirely separate it from how drunk he was when he made the decision to help, how he could never seem to do anything good without also doing the thing he hates so much about himself.

But there’s a little bit of pride in him now. Just the smallest bit. 

“Besides,” Connor says, running his fingers through Hank’s beard, “I would have thought you were hot either way. And you would have been attracted to me too, I think...even if you didn’t like me right away. Maybe we would have had some hot hate sex in the DPD bathroom...” 

“Jesus Christ,” Hank laughs, scrubbing a hand over his face. “Yeah. Sure. Maybe we would have.”

Connor looks pleased with himself, and Hank thinks he’s so cute that he can’t help but kiss him, once and then again. His arm is wrapped around Connor’s waist, and when he drags his hand up his side, he feels the indent where his chassis is cracked under his fingers.

Connor shivers against him, and Hank is pulling his hand back and opening his mouth to apologize, but Connor catches him by the wrist before he can. “It’s okay,” he whispers. “It doesn’t hurt, really. You just surprised me.”

“Can I...” Hank stops, collects himself. His mouth is dry, but he wants to understand it - the way Connor is put together, and the ways he’s broken. “Can I see it?” 

Connor tilts his head and says, “Are you going to get angry about it if I show you?”

“I’m already angry, baby. I’ve been angry since you told me about it. No one should have hurt you.”

Connor’s face softens and he kisses him before he pushes himself up to straddle Hank’s hips. Hank watches as he pulls Hank’s old band t-shirt over his head and drops it beside him, as Connor’s synthskin disappears on his side and leaves the cracked chassis exposed.

It’s worse than Hank thought it would be - the plastic caved in, shattered into thousands of fragmented lines, shards of it gouged out. Hank reaches up to touch it, feeling sick over it, and Connor watches him quietly.

“I know how you feel about it,” Hank says softly, “but I thought, maybe...if I’m not a client anymore, maybe your rule doesn’t apply, and I could pay for you to get this repaired.”

Something on Connor’s face shifts as he rolls off of Hank’s lap and flops back down at his side. Hank would worry he’s said the wrong thing, fucked up somehow and overstepped, if Connor didn’t immediately reach for his hand.

“I don’t know,” he whispers. 

“Okay,” Hank says quickly. “It’s okay. I just...I don’t think you should have to carry him around with you.”

Connor taps his temple where his LED spins. “That’s the way my brain works. I’m always lying on the pavement, in the rain. I can’t get away from it.” He sighs and pushes that lock of hair out of his face. “Besides,” he adds, “repairs to my original components are specialized, and need to be done at CyberLife’s main location, and...I don’t want to go back there. I haven’t been back since November, and I don’t...” 

He’s scared, Hank realizes all at once as Connor trails off.

He gathers him into his arms, because Connor said that helped the same way smoking does. “I know it’s ugly,” Connor whispers into his shirt. “I wish I could just get it repaired. I should be able to just go, but...” 

Hank shakes his head and kisses Connor’s hair. “It’s not,” he says quickly. “Nothing about you is ugly. It’s okay - you can do whatever you want, okay?”

Connor nods against him, and Hank holds him until his LED cycles back to blue.

Hank runs a hand over his back, through his hair, and he hopes it's soothing. He waits until Connor’s LED hasn’t been yellow for a few minutes, and then he says, "Your...upgrades, wherever you got those...they can't repair you?"

Connor breathes a soft laugh against him. "You can say my dick, Hank."

Hank nudges him. "I'm talking about the drinking, too."

Connor smiles. "I went to a third-party shop for those. It's human-owned, but they never worked for CyberLife, and they have an android technician working there who I trust. They can do small repairs, things that don't require replacement biocomponents." Connor cants his head and says, "Please don't ask me about the smoking, and my filtration system, and what happens when I need a new one. Just...I know, okay? I think about it all the time."

"I wasn't going to," Hank says, and he wasn't, not after last time, even if it was on his mind. "I was just wondering if there was anywhere else you could go."

"Hank," Connor says. He puts a hand on Hank's chest and rests his forehead over his heart. "I know you're worried about me, but I don't want to talk about this anymore. I'm sorry...is that okay?"

"Yeah, honey," Hank says quickly. "Of course." 

He thinks, unbidden, about the case files stacked on his desk, all the hate crimes against androids, so many that they can't keep up with all of them and any without a clear line of evidence end up buried. He knows Connor can take care of himself, but he's seen so many intake photos of androids with damage that's similar to the crack in Connor's side, but far worse.

It's a kinder world they live in than the one that existed in November...but still not a kind one. 

But Connor is trying to move past it, that much is plain. He stretches at Hank's side with a smile that looks just the smallest bit forced, and he says, "Do you want to go shopping today?" To prove his point, he hooks a finger in the waistband of Hank's boxers, stretching what remains of the elastic and letting it snap back against his hip. "I hate these, you know."

"You've said.” Hank rolls his eyes, although it’s all good-natured. "I called in sick. If we run into anyone from the precinct and they tell Jeff, he'll be pissed as hell. I've worn out my good grace with him." 

Connor doesn't pout - he rarely does when he understands Hank's reasoning - but he does have that look of quiet, subtle disappointment on his face that Hank is quickly learning how to recognize, a look that hurts much more.

"Did you...want to go somewhere?" Hank asks. 

Connor shrugs. "We don't have to. I just thought...if we're dating now, I thought it would be nice to go somewhere together."

Hank realizes all at once that Connor wants to go on a date - the first one where Hank won't pay him at the end of it. It occurs to him that Connor has probably never gone on a real one before.

Hank kisses his temple. "Okay. Let's go, then."

"Not if it's going to get you in trouble..."

"It's okay," Hank says quickly, because his mind is suddenly made up. "You can put your clothes from last night in the dryer while I eat, and then maybe we can drive out to Ann Arbor so we can do what we want."

Connor smiles. "Okay. I'd like that." He leans in to kiss Hank, languid and unhurried. "I love you," he whispers, and Hank decides he likes those words just as much now as he did in the afterglow last night.

It’s weird, maybe, how easily Connor slots into his life and his home, how all it takes is the two of them getting ready together for Hank to start to forget how it felt to be so lonely. Connor gathers his clothes from their crumpled pile on the floor and leaves the bedroom to throw them in the dryer, and then Hank hears him letting Sumo out, too, talking to the dog while he does.

It’s nice. It more than makes up for the stiffness in his back hindering his movements as he gets dressed.

Connor comes back in time to see him struggling, although he’s quiet like a cat when he wants to be, and Hank doesn’t realize he’s there until he feels Connor’s hand between his shoulder blades.

“Your back hurts?” he asks as Hank pulls his shirt over his head.

“I’m okay. We just went a little hard last night. I’ll walk it off in a few minutes.”

“I guess we did,” Connor says, and he sounds like he couldn’t be more pleased about it. “I could give you a back rub, if you wanted. I’m very good at them. I’m programmed with considerable information on human musculature...” 

“Isn’t that for analyzing crime scenes?” Hank asks wryly.

“Yes,” Connor says. “But it’s helpful here, too.” He runs his hand down Hank’s back, feeling for the way Hank is carrying himself, and then he gently presses his fingers in above Hank’s hip, right where it hurts. 

“Huh,” Hank says. “Point taken.”

It’s a tempting offer, but he doesn’t let himself get sidetracked, mostly because he’s decided that he wants to make today special for Connor. Usually when he calls off work he reaches for the bottle by mid-afternoon at the latest, but Connor has given him a different sort of high to chase.

Hank cleans up in the bathroom while Connor waits, and when he comes out, he finds him sitting on the couch with Sumo, curiously flipping through some of the case files Hank brought home from work. 

“Sorry,” Connor says, sheepish, when he sees him coming, setting the files on the coffee table.

“It’s okay. You warned me you were nosy.” Hank turns the coffeemaker on and joins Connor in what little space Sumo has left unoccupied on the couch, nodding at the case files. “Do you miss it?”

“Yeah,” Connor says softly. “That’s the thing about being programmed to do a task - I’ll always miss the work, and I’ll always feel incomplete if I’m not doing it.” He sighs. “I wouldn’t want to be a cop, though. Even if I could.” 

“No?” Hank asks, and Connor shakes his head.

“You’re good,” he says simply. “Most of them aren’t. I don’t have the patience to try to figure out how to be accepted and liked by men like that, and even less to figure out how to do good in a system so broken.” 

It’s shit Hank knows - hell, it’s shit he struggles with, too, shit he’s always struggled with - but Connor is still searching his face like he’s worried he offended him, so Hank reaches for his hand.

“It’s okay,” he says. “It is broken.”

It’s not until they’re in the car, pulling onto the highway, that Hank asks the question he’s been wondering since he met Connor. He squeezes Connor’s fingers, because of course the first thing Connor always does in the car is to reach for his hand, and it seems that hasn’t changed. “If you could do any work you wanted,” he says, “what would you do?”

It’s a bright day, and Connor is wearing sunglasses he doesn’t need - it’s transparent that he thinks they make him look good, and Hank is continually surprised by how attractive he finds that tiny bit of vanity when Connor shows it.

Still, Hank wishes he could see Connor’s whole face while he considers the question, even if he doesn’t consider it long.

“When I first moved out of the squat, before I started the escort work, I tried private investigations.” 

Hank finds that endlessly interesting. “You didn’t like it?”

Connor shakes his head. “I liked it. But the only people who wanted to hire me were androids, and none of them had any more money than I did. I took a few clients pro bono, but I needed something that paid the bills. I thought I could keep doing it on the side, maybe, just work for free, but I haven’t had the time. I wish I did - I know a lot of androids aren’t satisfied with the way their cases are being handled by the police.”

“Yeah,” Hank says. “There’s a need there, for sure.” 

“I’ve never told anyone that before,” Connor says. “It would ruin the illusion, so I just let my other clients think I want to do exactly what I’m doing.”

“Anyone who buys that is dumb as fuck,” Hank says. “You’re too smart not to be bored playing arm candy.” 

“Aw,” Connor says, squeezing Hank’s hand and smiling. “I’m good at playing stupid, though...or, at least, less smart. And people see whatever flatters them.”

Silence stretches between them as they drive down the highway. Connor fiddles with the radio every now and then, but he mostly looks out the window. “I’ve only been outside Detroit once,” he says. “I got a cab to Grand Rapids once to see a movie. I just wanted to go somewhere new, but it was expensive, so I haven’t gone again.”

It’s that thought, Connor alone, trapped by his circumstances, that dislodges the words that have been sitting on Hank’s tongue.

“I wish you didn’t have to do any of this shit anymore,” he says, and Connor tilts his head with a small smile.

“It’s okay,” he says softly. “It’s just the way things are.”

It’s the resignation in Connor’s voice that really destroys Hank, the fact that he’s never had anything other than this, that he knows his situation isn’t good but it’s also better than what he had.

Yeah, it’s the way things are, and he doesn’t blame Connor for not knowing how to wish they were better or want something more than what he’s been given. But Hank wants it for him, so badly.

They have a good day. They go shopping at some department store, and Hank manages to get mostly practical shit despite Connor’s influence, new jeans and a few shirts Connor doesn’t hate, and a few packages of the cotton underwear that have served him just fine his whole life. 

(He doesn’t manage to sway Connor from the silk boxers that mysteriously turn up in his cart after Connor was looking at them, but you win and lose some.) 

He gets Connor something, too. And that makes him feel young as fuck, walking through the lingerie section with his very pretty boyfriend. It’s empty enough in the mid-afternoon on a weekday that there isn’t much use in feeling embarrassed or out of place. 

It just feels revitalizing, like something he might have done as a teenager, if only he’d given less of a shit what people thought of him then.

Connor tries to make him decide between the white teddy and the violet babydoll, which is how they end up with both. 

He gets Connor a few other things, too...because whatever, he hasn’t had anywhere to funnel the impulse in the last few years and has sort of forgotten about it, but Hank has always liked buying gifts for people. 

And Connor is easy to spoil. He dresses well, but Hank has also seen the same shirt on him twice now, like he doesn’t have much in his closet beyond the suits people have bought to dress him up in, or the lingerie when they want something else (a picture - which Hank knows Connor will send from time to time if it’s worth the investment to him - or something more, which...good luck, Hank thinks with some small sense of pride).

So he gets Connor a few sweaters, some patterned shirts that Connor picks (including a grey shirt with little French bulldogs over it that Hank thinks is cute as hell, even if Connor looks sheepish about it).

Hank rifles through the cart as they make their way to the front to check out. “Your taste is...kind of dorky,” he says, and he means it every bit as fondly as it sounds, because he’s well aware that his taste is kind of dorky, too.

Connor elbows him and laughs. “Don’t be mean.”

“I’m not. It’s very cute. I’m just surprised.” He gestures to what Connor’s wearing, the plain white button down and the dark jeans that fit well, in a staid sort of way.

Connor glances down at himself. “I usually just buy clothes for work when I go shopping for myself - it’s easier to justify the expense that way, and I prefer to be a blank, albeit sophisticated, slate.”

Hank knows he told Connor he wasn’t possessive - and he really isn’t - but he still sort of likes that Connor probably won’t wear any of this outside of their time together.

“Hey,” he says anyway, and he feels awkward for saying it, or wanting it, even though he thinks it’s allowed. “Listen. The lingerie...can you just...only wear that for me? I don’t care if you wear any of the rest of it out with your clients, but...”

Connor, for his part, looks profoundly pleased as he cuts Hank off by grasping his shoulder and leaning up to kiss his cheek. “Yeah,” he says softly. “That’s just for you. I promise.”

"Okay," Hank says. He feels sorry for asking, in some ways, even though it's plain Connor doesn't mind. It's more that it he hasn't asked for something for himself for years, and even before Cole and all his self-punishment, it's not something that came naturally to him. 

It feels uncomfortable, and it must be obvious on his face, because Connor takes his hand and looks at him with a searching expression. "Hank," he says softly. "It's okay to ask me for things like that, okay? I want you to. I want us to have things that are just for us, too." 

"Okay," Hank says again, and Connor smiles. 

They go to a movie afterwards at some arthouse theater that Connor finds after some brief searching. They're showing Dirty Dancing as part of some classics lineup.

"That on your list of pop culture to work through?" Hank asks when Connor suggests it.

"Um," Connor says, LED briefly cycling yellow. "I've seen it already. I just like it."

" _You_ like Dirty Dancing?" Hank asks, incredulous, and Connor shrugs with a small smile.

"It's...uncomplicated. All the conflict is all wrapped up in time for the happy ending. I like things like that." 

"Huh," Hank says. "Okay. That's fair."

When they park outside the theater, Hank opens his door to get out, although Conor reaches for his arm before he can. "Can I borrow your keys?" he asks.

"Yeah." It should occur to Hank sooner what Connor needs them for, but he hands them over without much thought, and it's not until Connor flips the visor down and raises one of the keys to his blinking LED that Hank understands.

"There's no one here," he says. "You can probably leave it in."

Connor doesn't stop, fitting the key under his LED and wincing as he gouges it out. He catches the little biocomponent in his hand and slips it into his wallet.

"People get annoyed by the LED in dark spaces," Connor says, looking at Hank. "It's just easier this way."

What Connor isn't saying is that androids are harassed in and outside movie theaters all the time by people who were annoyed by their LEDs, that sometimes it's just a verbal altercation and sometimes it's so much worse.

"You ready?" Connor asks, like it's nothing, like he isn't always gouging parts of himself out and then putting himself back together to make himself palatable.

Hank pulls him in and kisses his temple where his LED would be before they go.

The theater is filled with retro seating, the old two person seats that Hank hasn't seen anywhere since he was a kid. Connor sits close to him, leaning against Hank's shoulder, and Hank pays as much attention to Connor's weight against him as he does to the movie.

They get dinner afterwards, and Connor watches him eat, and they talk about Connor's pop culture list, and Hank's work, and it feels easy, and good. 

It's long past dark by the time Hank drives Connor back to his apartment. He walks him up, even though he needs to get home to let Sumo out, and he looks around at the small room when Connor lets them in.

"How much do you pay for this place?" Hank asks, glancing around. 

Connor hangs his coat by the door. "Twelve hundred a month."

"Fuck," Hank says, dragging the word out.

"I know," Connor says. "There are cheaper apartments, but they all require proof of steady income and employment, and most androids don't have that." He pushes his hair out of his face. "It's expensive to be poor, and more expensive to be hated."

And again, he says it like it's nothing, walks up and kisses Hank like it's nothing, like Hank's heart doesn't hurt so much for him.

And Hank can't help, but he can try to put a balm on it, at least. 

"Why don't you just come home with me again?" he asks when they part.

Connor tilts his head. "It seems early for that. And I don't want to put you out."

"You're not. Just...this place sucks, okay?"

"I know it does, but it's mine," Connor says, a small challenge in his voice. 

Hank sighs. He doesn't want to fight with him again the way they did after his awards ceremony, but it's hard - Connor is proud, and stubborn, and so Hank doesn't always know how to help him.

"Please," he says, instead of pushing any harder. "I want you to." 

Connor's face softens as he leans his forehead against Hank's cheek. "You can't fix any of this, you know," he whispers.

"I know, but...can you let me try anyway?"

Connor hesitates, and Hank listens to him breathe a moment, before he says, "Okay."

Hank waits while Connor packs a change of clothes, and he wonders what he’s doing, exactly. Connor can’t come home with him every night just because Hank doesn’t like the thought of him here, in the home he’s managed to build for himself in spite of everything. 

He has the brief, insane thought of asking Connor to move in...but then what? It’s difficult to imagine Connor continuing with the escort work if he lived at Hank’s house - if he agreed to that in the first place - so it would mean Connor giving up his apartment, and his work, and sure, he hates both of those things...but like he said, they’re his.

And besides, Hank has fucked up two relationships by moving too quickly. He doesn’t want to fuck this up. He doesn’t want Connor to resent him, or to sit on his couch waiting for him to come home every day. 

Connor would be bored. Even if he said yes, Hank knows he would be bored eventually, and that’s when the resentment would come...

He’s so torn. He doesn’t know what to do.

All he really can do is trust Connor, he supposes. 

“You ready?” Connor asks then, pulling his bag over his shoulder and nodding towards the door.

“Yeah,” Hank says. Connor slips his hand into Hank’s back pocket after they step outside and he locks the door behind them, and Hank looks down to see his innocent smile and the devilish glint in his eyes before he squeezes Hank’s ass.

Hank shakes his head and drops an arm around his shoulders, kissing his hair. “You’re bad.”

“I’m yours,” Connor replies, smiling.

And yeah, Hank guesses that’s true. 

It’s late by the time they get across the city to Hank’s house, and Hank works first shift in the morning - Jeff _probably_ wouldn’t fire him if he was late, but between calling off again and plainly sneaking off to make out with Connor during a ceremony where Jeff wanted the DPD to look good, Hank doesn’t want to take his chances.

He takes a sleeping pill, which is at least better than drinking himself to sleep like he usually does. Connor doesn’t say anything about it, but Hank knows he sees.

Connor didn’t bring anything to sleep in, but he helps himself to the clothes Hank lent him the previous night - they’re still folded neatly in Hank’s dresser, right where Connor left them.

Hank gets into bed, puts on his reading glasses and retrieves the book he was reading but hasn’t touched in months, mostly so he doesn’t look like he’s staring at Connor while he’s changing, even if he absolutely is.

The bedside table on Connor’s side has always been purely decorative, with empty drawers, so Hank gestures to it when Connor climbs under the covers next to him. “If you want to keep anything here, you can use that,” he says. 

Connor glances at the bedside table, and then back at Hank. “Okay,” he says. “Your glasses are cute.”

He leans in to kiss Hank, and to Connor’s credit, it’s soft and gentle right up until the moment he pushes Hank’s book aside and climbs into his lap, nipping at Hank’s lip and rocking their hips together. 

“Hey,” Hank stills him with a hand on his arm. “I want to, but I really don’t have another one in me.”

“That’s okay,” Connor says. “I know your back hurts.”

“At least _try_ not to sound pleased about it,” Hank laughs 

Connor gives him a sheepish smile and kisses him again. “Can we try something?”

For once in Hank’s life, he’s tired, and he thinks he might be able to get to sleep, and that he should really take advantage of that, but that doesn’t stop him from saying, “What are you thinking?” 

Connor looks away - it’s one of the few times Hank has seen him look embarrassed. “Can I keep you in my mouth tonight? My most sensitive analysis components are on my tongue.”

It takes Hank a moment to realize what he means. “You want...to sleep with my dick in your mouth?” He doesn’t know that he’ll ever get used to this, to Connor wanting him _this_ much.

“Is that okay?” Connor asks. “You don’t have to fuck my mouth or anything - you can, if you want to, but I just want to hold you and be close to you.”

“Yeah,” Hank says softly, swallowing hard. He doesn’t know how to say no to him. “Okay. If you want to.” 

“I do,” Connor says softly, and then he slips down Hank’s body, under the covers almost entirely. He pulls Hank’s boxers over his hips until his cock springs free, and then he settles himself between Hank’s legs, breath ghosting over his skin. 

He’s careful when he takes Hank into his mouth - he doesn’t hollow his cheeks or suck down, although he does take Hank all the way in, and Hank watches Connor’s eyelids flutter when he runs fingers through his hair.

Hank has less resolve than Connor does, in the end, despite his protestations that he’s too tired - Connor needs to reach up and put an arm across Hank’s hips when he reflexively bucks up into his mouth.

“Shh,” Connor breathes when he pulls off for a moment. “You’re amazing. I can feel you in my throat.”

He lowers himself back down onto Hank’s cock, swallowing it down, and Hank thinks for a moment about taking Connor up on the offer, to rock his hips up until Connor gives him what he wants and sucks. It wouldn’t even take that long to get him off, not with how good Connor’s mouth feels.

He doesn’t, though, because this is nice. He wasn’t sure he would get anything out of this in the same way Connor does, especially without moving, but Connor’s mouth is warm and softer than it has any right to be, and he hums occasionally when Hank runs his fingers through his hair, sending a gentle vibration through him.

Hank doesn’t have Connor’s analysis components, but there’s still an intimacy in this he understands. 

Connor lays his cheek against Hank’s thigh, body gone pliant between Hank’s legs, and Hank pets his hair until Connor is in stasis.

Connor might be asleep before him, but Hank follows not long after.

* * *

It's still dark out when Hank wakes up.

It's still dark, and Connor really wasn't fucking around when he said he wanted to keep Hank in his mouth through the night, because he's still between Hank's legs, his cheek hot against Hank's skin where he's lying. 

Hank's fingers are still in Connor's hair, and his cock is still in Connor's very warm, very soft mouth. He's hard, and he can feel himself at the back of Connor's mouth, pressing against the entrance of his throat, and he's embarrassed by the sound that escapes him because it can really only be described as a whimper. 

It's entirely undignified, and he's grateful Connor isn't awake to hear it, even if he does need to get him up for his own sake. He can't just lie here like this.

At least, he thinks Connor's still in stasis, until Connor moves, reaching for Hank's hand and slipping their fingers together. He lifts his head from Hank's thigh, although he doesn't pull off of Hank's cock yet.

Hank squeezes his hand, or maybe he clings to it like a lifeline. "Hey," he says, and he's not proud of how strangled it comes out. "How long have you been awake?"

Hank looks down where Connor's face is half-concealed by the covers in time to see the flash of irritation on his face, as if Hank is showing some kind of audacity by interrupting him, before he lifts his head, letting Hank's cock slip from between his lips with a sound that's wet and obscene.

"An hour," Connor says, wrapping a hand around Hank's cock in the absence of his mouth.

"An hour," Hank repeats, tongue feeling thick in his mouth.

"Mhm." Connor presses a kiss to the underside of Hank's belly, and then the curve of his hip.

"You've just been lying here. Not moving. With my dick in your mouth. For an hour."

"My attention span isn't like yours," Connor says, shrugging, "and you're very interesting." He licks a filthy stripe up the underside of Hank's cock, as if he's proving his point. "Do you want me to get you off? You've been hard for..."

"Jesus Christ, don't tell me how long I've been hard for," Hank says, cutting him off, and Connor gives him a sheepish smile.

"I was enjoying it," he says, and that's the last thing he says before he takes Hank's cock in his mouth again. 

He's relentless, and singularly focused, and it's one of the most wild experiences Hank has ever had, even just these few moments of it - the way Connor doesn't stop, takes him all the way down even when Hank hits the back of his mouth, the way his saliva is thicker than anything Hank has ever felt. His mouth is so fucking wet, and hot, and...

Hank squeezes Connor's hand, hard, because Connor seems determined to swallow him and if he keeps going, he'll get that exact wish, and Hank wants...him.

Hank wants him. 

"Hey," Connor complains when Hank pulls him off and up so he can kiss him. He pinches Hank's nipple in what Hank thinks is supposed to be a punishment but which he thinks feels good. "I want to taste you, you know."

"I know," Hank says, kissing the irritated little crease in his forehead. "But it's dark, and I want you where I can see you."

"That's sentimental and gross, Hank," Connor says, although he can't quite keep his straight face as he slips the sweatpants he borrowed from Hank over his hips. "Next time, you're coming down my throat. I want you to.”

Hank couldn’t argue with that, even if he had a mind to.

“Does your back still hurt?” Connor asks, but before Hank can answer him, he climbs astride his hips, looking down at their cocks together like he’s transfixed.

“You’re so big,” he whispers, and Hank almost wishes he would stop saying that just because it always hits him straight in his pride, threatening to make him feel a sort of confidence that he hasn’t since he was a younger, better man and that feels uncomfortable now.

(He doesn’t really wish he would stop, of course.)

“Connor,” Hank whispers, and he doesn’t ask him to move, but Connor knows that’s what he’s begging for all the same. He readjusts himself over Hank, and Hank reaches for his hips, around him to his ass. He’s intending to finger him open, but Connor shakes his head.

“It’s okay,” he whispers, frantic. “I’m ready. I’m leaking.” 

Hank is going to die. His heart is going to give out, and Connor is going to have to call Jeff and explain how he fucked him to death without even ever fucking him, that he put him in the hospital with a few carefully placed words, and so he won’t be coming in to work today, sorry. 

Connor sinks down on to him, and Hank doesn’t know what to look at, if he should be watching the light playing across his beautiful face or the lifelike clench of the muscles in his stomach or his cock resting flushed and pretty against Hank’s belly when he seats himself against his hips, Hank’s cock buried to the hilt inside him.

Hank tries to rock his hips up into him, but Connor is heavy enough that he can’t get much leverage, and Connor doesn’t move either, just sits there watching Hank with a small, satisfied smile on his face.

“Connor,” Hank finally groans. “Baby. Move.” 

Connor tilts his head like he doesn’t understand the request. “You wanted to see me,” he says, and he clenches his muscles like a vice around Hank where he’s buried inside him then in a mean tease. “So look at me.”

“Yeah?” Hank asks. He reaches up to brush his thumb over Connor’s nipple, pebbled tightly on his chest. “You like being looked at. Don’t you?”

It’s obvious. Hank thinks Connor is absolutely vain enough to want to watch himself get fucked in the mirror, and he files that little idea away for later. 

“Not always,” Connor whispers. “I like it when you look at me, though. I want you to think I’m attractive.”

“Oh, honey,” Hank breathes. He traces the metal rim of Connor’s thirium pump, and that crack in his chassis, and he pulls him down to kiss his LED spinning frantically on his temple. “I think you’re so beautiful. Everything about you.”

Connor kisses him and whispers, “Tell me you want me,” into his mouth, like it’s a secret he’s feeding him, something he’s afraid to ask for. It’s that razor thin edge of uncertainty he sees in Connor sometimes, the pendulum swing into the anxious thoughts that plague him, that he’ll never be wanted for what he is.

“Of course I want you,” Hank says, voice soft. “I want you more than I’ve wanted anything in so long, baby. You’re perfect.”

Connor whimpers at that, and maybe it’s a masked sob at the words, or maybe it’s just because Hank’s cock is still buried balls deep inside him. Hank doesn’t know, but he does settle his hands on Connor’s hips and gently squeeze.

“Come on, baby,” he whispers. “Ride me.” 

Connor looks at him with heavy-lidded eyes, lips parted, hungry. He rolls his hips forward gently once, and then again, and then he sets a punishing pace that Hank isn’t prepared for, lifting himself up and slamming himself down.

Connor is beautiful like this, wild and untamed and just a touch vulnerable, like he’s always trying to be good enough, always trying to figure out what Hank wants, even when he’s riding him into the mattress with such reckless abandon. 

They both have to grab the headboard for leverage - Hank’s hands pressed back against it, Connor's fingers closed around the top of it as he fucks himself down.

It’s a small miracle they don’t break it, Hank thinks. 

He’s glad he doesn’t have it in him to last long, or maybe they would.

And Connor does drive Hank over the edge in no time at all, although Hank holds out longer than he thought he might considering he was ready to go off like a shot the moment he woke up in Connor’s mouth. Hank doesn’t ask about pulling out this time, and Connor makes the most gorgeous fucking sound when he comes inside him.

He sits astride Hank’s hips, hands braced on Hank’s chest, breathing hard, his cock red and leaking and so hard and pretty against Hank’s belly, collecting himself even though he hasn’t come yet. 

“Connor,” Hank says in a low voice, because he’s sharp, and it’s taken him no time at all to realize that Connor likes his voice, that he responds to it every time. “Come here, baby. Let me take care of you.”

Connor looks at him, a touch dazed, but he follows where Hank guides him when he takes him by the hand and ushers him further up his body, until he’s straddling Hank’s shoulders instead.

“What...” Connor starts, but Hank puts a hand on his ass and tips him forward until he can wrap his lips around his cock. 

And Connor’s reaction really doesn’t disappoint - he swears, voice strangled, and grabs for anything he can reach to stabilize himself, the headboard and Hank’s hand, which he squeezes hard. He tastes like nothing, just clean, maybe a hint of something synthetic like plastic. 

Hank looks up at him, waits for Connor to open his tightly shut eyes and meet his gaze. It takes a long moment, but when he does, Hank gives him a look filled with every ounce of heat he can muster.

And Connor gets it, because he’s bright and brilliant. Hank sees the moment when he understands, when he inhales a shaking breath and slowly rocks his hips forward, rutting his cock further into Hank’s mouth, pulling back, doing it again.

It’s the perfect angle to watch that proud clench of Connor’s jaw as he tries to stay in control and falls apart instead. He stops being gentle after a certain point, but Hank doesn’t need him to be - he holds his hand, and he watches Connor’s face the entire way through it, even when Connor’s eyes are closed and he isn’t meeting his gaze, in a sort of peaceful, content surrender. 

Hank doesn’t take control back until he feels Connor lose the last shred of his. He gets an arm around Connor’s hips and rolls him to the side, onto his back, and he follows right after him, finding his place between Connor’s parted legs and taking his cock in his mouth right to the root. Hank pushes two fingers inside Connor, feels him slick with lubricant and Hank’s come as he crooks his fingers, and Connor buries his fingers in Hank’s hair and _pulls_.

 _Come hard for me, honey_ , Hank would say if his mouth was free, but he settles for taking Connor’s hand and curling his fingers inside him again.

And even without him asking for it, Connor does exactly what he wants, arching off the bed with a hoarse cry and filling Hank’s mouth with something plainly synthetic - it’s oil-like in its consistency, with the faintest hint of a metallic tang.

And fuck if Hank doesn’t swallow all of it, and then keep Connor in his mouth for another moment as he calms down and catches his breath.

When he finally pulls off of him and flops down at Connor’s side, Hank is endlessly pleased by the dazed expression on his face, like his processors haven’t quite caught up with him.

Hank reaches for him, touches his cheek and kisses his forehead, and he whispers, “You’re so good, baby,” because he knows Connor likes that from the way he preens under it every time. 

But more than that, he knows that Connor _has_ to be good. That his job and what little is his and his survival itself have always depended on being well-liked, desired, approved of.

It’s where his vanity comes from. It’s also what formed that uncertainty that Hank catches a glimpse of from time to time. Connor knows he’s the most advanced model CyberLife ever built. He knows he’s attractive. He knows he’s smart, and quick-witted, and charismatic.

But he also knows that he’ll lose everything if he isn’t. 

So Hank holds him, running a hand through his hair and whispering to him that he’s beautiful and incredible and so fucking perfect, because Connor can make his edges sharp when he needs to, when that’s what he’s met with, but what he really needs is gentleness. 

And Hank hasn’t let himself think about how long he might get to keep him, because forever seems way too fucking good to be true, but as long as he has him, he’s going to give it to him.

“You’re amazing,” Connor whispers when he finally speaks, after several minutes have passed. 

Hank isn’t. He knows that.

But Connor makes him feel like he is, like he’s everything he liked about himself before and none of the things he hates now...like he has a life ahead of him, and not one behind him that he’s wasted. 

Hank kisses Connor’s hair, and he holds him like he’s trying to keep him, and when he walks in to work almost an hour late that morning, it’s the best he’s felt about his poor attendance in years.

There’s a text from Connor on his phone from after Hank dropped him off when he checks it. “Love you,” it says. “Have a good day.”

“Love you too, baby,” Hank writes back, and he thinks that maybe he will.

* * *

So the days pass, and then their first week together, and their second. And they date. Hank is still trying to figure out what Connor likes and how he wants to spend their days together, and it’s complicated by the fact that he seems equally happy to do nothing at all at Hank’s house and to go out somewhere, shopping or to a movie or on a day trip outside of Detroit entirely.

Hank never cares what they do, as long as Connor has a good time. And Connor is sort of easy that way - even when he admitted to not liking a set Hank took him to at a bar, he still enjoyed the new experience.

(It was a band with a strong metal influence, so Hank knew it was a stretch. Connor is a little snob who “likes his music to be less loud, thank you,” and Hank thinks that’s cute, even if he’ll never admit it out loud.) 

Hank starts keeping cases of seltzer in the fridge in assorted flavors for when Connor comes over, and it’s a reward on its own when he finds one that Connor hasn’t tried before and that he really likes.

He has a small collection of pictures on his phone that Connor has sent to him, lingerie and pictures of him ready to go out and a nude photo that’s edited so tastefully, the lighting and the image composition and Connor all put together so it looks like something out of a high end magazine and not a picture shot in Connor’s shitty apartment. 

(Connor does get a dick pic out of Hank later, but it takes days of begging, and not even because Hank is ashamed of taking the picture for him, but because he knows it’s going to look like a crappy cell phone picture in comparison.)

Hank drinks less. He doesn’t stop entirely - he knows he’s addicted, and so it doesn’t surprise him that he can’t just put the bottle down altogether - but Connor is a force, and where Hank’s thoughts would usually wander to everything he’s lost, how fucking sad he is, how much he hates himself when he sits alone in his home after work, now he spends so much of that time thinking about Connor instead. 

There just isn’t as much space for everything else.

(And the crazy thing is that, when something stops those thoughts for a while, when they aren’t allowed to just keep cycling, they don’t come back as strong the next time. Hank isn’t trying to be kinder to himself, necessarily, but it’s a byproduct all the same.) 

They still go to Connor’s drive-in theater every week, although they rarely pay attention to the movie. Connor gives Hank the best head of his life in the back seat of his car one night - Hank wonders if it will ever stop amazing him that things like this never feel dirty or sleazy with Connor, but they never do. 

Connor is so sweet, even when he’s being a tease, and Hank is so endlessly in awe of him that maybe he shouldn’t be surprised by that at all.

And of course the sex is amazing. Connor is adventurous and so versatile in what he wants that Hank feels younger than he has in years, and so fucking wanted. He thinks, quite genuinely, that Connor is incredible - he’s unyielding and demanding and pliant and just a touch submissive all at once, somehow, and regardless of what it is, Hank feels so alive, and so fucking lucky, just from giving him what he needs, and from letting Connor take care of him in turn.

Hank makes it three weeks before he has a rough night that rivals any that came before Connor. He’s ashamed of it, mostly because he can’t even say what’s wrong, and if there’s anything he’s hated over the years, it’s fucking up his life and destroying himself without even knowing what he’s pissed about or broken over in the first place.

So many parents lose their kids without doing this, after all. They grieve, and they never quite move on, but they also don’t do _this_ . And Cole has been gone for _years_ , but here Hank is, still coping in the same unhealthy, unnecessary way, and that just makes him hate himself more.

He thinks about calling Connor when he has the first drink, but his pride stops him. He doesn’t want to hurt Connor, and he doesn’t want him to know. He just wants to sweep this under the rug, drink himself to sleep and wake up better tomorrow.

It’s not until his vision is blurring before him and he feels so fucking sick that Hank’s pride abandons him. It’s past midnight, but Connor still picks up on the first ring when he calls.

“Hey,” Hank says, and he knows he’s slurring his speech, that Connor probably already knows what he’s doing. “I’ll transfer you money for the cab, but can you come over? I’m...fuck. I’m having a bad night.”

“Yeah,” Connor says immediately, without thinking, and that simple word makes tears prick Hank’s eyes. “Don’t worry about the money - I’ve got it. I’ll be there soon - half an hour, forty-five minutes, depending on how long it takes the cab. Do you want me to stay on the line with you?”

“Yeah,” Hank says, voice breaking, so Connor does.

Later that night, Connor holds his hair back while he vomits into the toilet. Hank tells him he’s sorry, and he means it, so much. 

Connor turns his body temperature down to help with Hank’s nausea when Hank feels well enough to try to go to bed, and he holds him through the night, and Hank feels like shit in the morning, but it’s so much easier than doing it alone.

Connor nestles in close to him when he wakes up and whispers, “I’m glad you called me.” 

And Hank has never known how to ask for help all these years - he’s always preferred to suffer in silence, and maybe that’s why he hurts so much, because shit festers in the dark, and because wounds only heal with air to breathe. 

But he’s asked for help once now, for once in his life, and Connor is still here come morning. He knows he can do it now. He might not be better, but at least he knows he can.

He wraps his arms around Connor, and he holds him as tightly as he can.

Connor drives him to work that day, because Hank has a violent headache but he doesn’t want to test Jeff’s patience by calling off again, and he cancels an appointment with a client so he can pick him up that evening, too.

At work, for the first time, Hank looks up how to quit drinking at home, because for once, the thought of it, of trying to live without the numbing balm of the bottle, doesn’t feel insurmountable.

So...he tries. And he slips up. But he drinks less, and he doesn’t replace the whiskey when he runs out, and it feels like a good start. 

Connor struggles in a different way, in a way that hurts Hank to watch sometimes. Hank sits up some nights and watches his LED cycling red, and he wonders what he’s dreaming about and if he’s going to wake up afraid.

It’s not uncommon for Connor to reach for him when he does, to grab for Hank’s hand with a quiet desperation, to slip the sweatpants he always borrows from his hips and pull Hank’s hand between his legs, for them to end up fucking slow and languid, because the only thing that helps Connor when he can’t escape his own thoughts is to overload his senses and burn the ugly shit out.

It happens sometimes when he’s awake, too. He’s afraid of heights, Hank learns the hard way, and he’s also too proud to admit it. Hank takes him stargazing at some planetarium on the roof of a skyscraper, but Connor spends more time looking down.

Hank realizes his mistake almost immediately - Connor, or mark 51, died falling off a building - so he says, “Hey, do you want to go? This was just some shit date idea I got online - we can go somewhere else.”

“I’m okay,” Connor says, when Hank knows he isn’t.

They don’t talk about it until almost a week later, when Connor is sitting on the floor in Hank’s living room with Sumo’s head in his lap. There’s a game on that Hank is barely paying attention to, so his mind is running instead. He doesn’t make the decision to say it, but suddenly it comes out of him anyway.

“Hey,” he says, nudging Connor with his foot. “I need you to tell me when you don’t want to do things, okay?”

Connor blinks at him, although he doesn’t look confused. Hank can start conversations out of nowhere, pick them up from weeks past, and Connor always remembers. “There’s never been anything I don’t want to do,” he says practically. “I like trying new things.”

“Connor,” Hank says. “Cut the shit, baby. I know you were scared on the roof.”

Connor lifts his chin. “I wanted to go. You planned it.” 

It’s a simple thing to say, but it breaks Hank apart anyway, because Connor spent so much time having to defer to people and hiding his fear so he wouldn’t be labeled defective and recalled, and those thought patterns still permeate his actions from time to time. 

“Hey.” Hank slips off the couch and sits on the floor beside Connor even though there’s a dull ache in his hip from last night - Connor’s fault. “Look at me. I thought that was some stupid cheesy romcom shit, but even if I didn’t and I wanted to be there, you can tell me when you’re afraid of something, or even when you’d just rather leave. I want you to tell me those things.”

Connor stares at the floor and buries his fingers in Sumo’s fur. “I’m not supposed to be afraid of things.”

“You wouldn’t be very alive if you weren’t.” 

Connor doesn’t say anything for the longest time, but then he does finally give the smallest nod of his head, and Hank feels better.

(He feels better because it’s a truth Connor should know, but also because he and Jen never figured out how to talk like this. They both always bottled their shit up, and that was why they fell apart in the end. Hank is trying to be better, and Connor may not have his own divorce always lurking behind him in every relationship, but he’s trying, too.)

By the time they’ve been together for a month, Hank has spent hours of that time watching Connor pore over his case files, sometimes finding things just from the crime scene photo that Hank missed. It eats at Hank more and more, that Connor can’t do the work he wants to do - _needs_ to do - because it won’t pay. 

He’s thinking about asking Connor to move in, to quit his work and drop his clients and do private investigations pro bono while Hank pays the bills, when Connor says, “How come you never come to my apartment?”

Hank is surprised by the question. “Do you...want me to?” 

Connor shrugs. “I’m just asking why.”

“I don’t know. You’ve never invited me.”

“You said it was shitty.”

“Oh, Jesus,” Hank says. Connor can hold a grudge, when he wants to. “I was just talking. I didn’t mean anything by it. I’ll come over and we can hang out there next time.” 

Connor considers it, and then says, “Okay,” and Hank knows he should just let it at that, but he’s never been much good at letting things be, either.

“It’s just...” he says. “Do you _really_ want to stay there forever?”

It is, admittedly, not the tone he should use to talk about the housing he knows Connor is proud of having provided for himself, and it’s not the way he planned to ask Connor if he might consider moving in, either.

He knows from the way Connor bristles, from that subtle yet proud lift of his chin, that he’s misstepped. 

“We’ve been over this,” Connor says. “It’s mine, and there’s nowhere else for people like me to go.”

“Yeah,” Hank replies quickly. “I know.”

“Then stop saying shit about my apartment,” Connor says, although he softens his face a moment later and adds, “Please.” 

“Yeah, okay. Sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Connor says softly, although he also gets up and goes outside to smoke, which Hank hasn’t seen him do in weeks. 

In the end, he doesn’t ask Connor to move in that night. He doesn’t think it would come off right.

* * *

The next morning, Hank drives Connor home, and he kisses him before he gets out of the car, and he wishes he could tell him that he’ll never understand how confusing this is, how difficult to go from being used as a tool to trying to carve out his space in this world, but he doesn’t begin to know how to say it or where to find the words.

He settles for just saying, “I love you,” and Connor squeezes his fingers and nods. 

“I love you, too,” he says before he goes.

It’s a late night for Hank at the precinct, although Connor had another appointment that night and they weren’t planning to see each other anyway. He’s in Jeff’s office, briefing him on a case, when he feels his phone vibrate once, and then again, and again.

He ignores it until it rings. “Sorry, hold on,” he says to Jeff, and he sees Connor’s picture on the screen when he fishes his phone out of his pocket.

“You need to take that?” Jeff asks.

His short tone implies that he really thinks Hank shouldn’t, but Hank still says, “Yeah. Hold on.”

“Hey, sweetheart,” he says when he steps outside and picks up. “What’s...”

“Hi, Hank,” a recorded message says. It isn’t Connor’s voice. “Check your phone, please. I love you.”

"Connor," Hank says, voice low and frantic. "Are you there, honey?"

There's no response, just an empty moment before the line goes dead.

Hank feels his stomach in his throat as he lowers his phone and opens his text messages.

"Hey," the first one says. "Can you come get me? I need to go to a repair center. It's...kind of an emergency."

"Sorry for texting - I can't talk," the message that came in immediately after says.

Hank barely reads the last one, although he hears it in Connor's voice, small and scared - "Hank? Please answer me. I'm sorry - I know you're at work." He's already moving across the bullpen for the door - he can hear Jeff calling after him as he goes, but he doesn't turn around.

He wants to text Connor back, but he wants to get to him more, so he doesn't until he's already pulling out of the lot and he can use voice to text.

"I'm coming," he says to his phone, his voice shaking. "What happened? Are you okay?"

He thinks about the worst - Connor was out with one of his clients tonight, so the guy asked Connor to do something he didn't want to, maybe, and there was an altercation, and Connor got hurt, somehow...it's his neck if he can't talk - that's where his vocal modulator is, and the wiring associated with it...

Hank almost rear-ends the car in front of him when Connor's reply comes in. "Just some asshole outside my apartment," it says. "Don't text while you're driving. I'm stable - we have time."

That doesn't make Hank drive any more carefully, even if he can hear Connor saying it. "I love you, honey," he says to his phone and the empty car, and he wishes Connor was there to hear it.

"I love you, too," Connor writes back, and tears blur Hank's vision as he pulls onto the highway. 

* * *

Connor has four hours until critical shutdown.

It could get worse. Maybe. The internal thirium leakage in his neck is enough of a concern, but he'd have more time if it weren't for his filtration system. The thirium is flooding it, and its performance is suboptimal after months of smoking. An undamaged unit still wouldn't be able to keep up, and it would still flood his system with toxins, damaging his biocomponents like dust in a computer vent, in time, but at least he would have more of it.

He focuses on all of that, the time, his biocomponents, what's happening internally, because it's easier to do than to admit the much simpler truth to himself. 

Which is, of course, that he's dying.

It happened fast, and it happened over nothing. He stayed outside after his client dropped him off, pulling a cigarette out to smoke before he went up to his apartment.

A man came up looking to bum a cigarette. He was high on red ice, but harmless enough, so Connor gave him one.

And then he made the mistake of giving him a light.

When Connor uses a lighter, the synthskin pulls back on the tips of his fingers from the heat, just the smallest bit. 

And the man noticed. 

It was sloppy on Connor's part. He knows that. It was his fault. He removes his LED to go out for a reason.

But that's how it started. The man saw the plastic of his chassis, asked why a tin can was dressed so nice and where he got the money for the suit. 

Connor dropped his cigarette to the ground and put it out, and he tried to duck around him - because disengaging entirely, even when he wants to respond, is always easier in the long run.

The junkie stepped into his path, though. Asked him for any money he had. 

And the thing Connor knows, that he's acutely aware of as he lies in his bed with a rag to his neck, trying to stop the bleeding, ruining the sheets he bought, is that this wouldn't have happened if he had just taken a few bills from his pocket and handed them over. 

But he's tired - he's so tired, still, even after months free of CyberLife, of being told what to do by anyone and everyone, of humans thinking they have some kind of right to him just because of what he is. 

He's fucking exhausted. 

So he straightened himself up, and he stared the man down, and he said no.

(What he said, actually, was "Piss off, and get the fuck out of my way," and it felt good, saying that. He isn't sorry he said it.)

He's just sorry for the rest of it.

Connor tried to brush past him, and the man pushed him back, and he just kept pushing, kept putting his hands on him, kept crowding him, kept calling him “tin can” and “toaster”.

And Connor could have just taken it. He could have. He knows how to take it, has the evidence of it on his chassis. He knows how to lie down. It’s like he told Hank - he’s always lying outside Eden Club, on the cold pavement, in the rain.

But that’s not living, and he’s tired of making himself small and palatable. 

So when the man hit him across the face, when the memory of being struck across the eye with the butt of a rifle in Hart Plaza flared up, Connor snapped - he hit back, and he hit _hard_.

He heard the man’s nose break, felt it shatter under his hand, and he watched the bruising rise on his skin as he brushed past him. “I told you to move,” he said, and then he continued on his way.

He heard the man get up. He heard him come after him. He even heard him draw the knife and flip it open. 

But there was no way to deflect it without breaking his arm, and Connor is always aware of the scrutiny on androids, of the people who still think they’re dangerous, of the media outlets who run every story they can to confirm that bias.

Connor carries that weight, always. 

They all do.

And so he took it. Because that’s always the choice, because he always has to decide when too much fight is doing more damage overall than good for him alone, and such is the burden.

The strike was careless - the blade hit Connor’s neck, which is critical, but which also gives him time before imminent shutdown. It damaged his vocal modulator, rendered him speechless almost immediately with a few involuntary static sounds in the back of his throat.

He could have stayed upright, but he sank back against the building instead. 

He knows this works, playing possum. He’s done it before, made himself mild and passive and broken just to get some asshole to leave him the fuck alone.

The man took the money off of him and ran, in the end, face ruined to bits. Connor hopes his nose doesn’t heal right. 

And he got himself up when it was safe, forced himself inside and up the stairs, into his apartment. He got a rag to try to slow the bleeding - although thirium doesn’t clot like human blood, so there’s no stopping it entirely without repair.

He texted Hank, and now he lies here feeling guilty, because it wasn’t fair to Hank, being petty and spiteful instead of just being safe.

Connor tells Hank he loves him. Just in case. Automates a message to Hank’s phone when he doesn’t answer his texts immediately.

He’d call a cab, and it might be faster, but he’s not sure he can walk anymore.

So he waits for Hank, warnings flaring in his HUD, and he watches his time pass him by, but damned if he’s dying like this, to some asshole stranger on the streets. If he has to go out early, it’s going to be in a better way than this. 

He’ll hold on out of pure spite if he has to.

There’s a knock on the door when a warning pings for severe obstruction in his filtration unit. Connor starts to text Hank to tell him it’s open, but he steps inside without the invitation, face pale, eyes red. 

It’s weighed on Connor this last month every time he tells Hank he loves him, this fear that it feels true to him but he also hasn’t lived enough or experienced enough to really know what it is, that he’s hurting Hank or not being good enough for him somehow when Hank deserves so much. He’s told himself that if it feels real to him, it’s real, but there’s still that small anxiety there.

But in this moment, when relief bursts through him, sharp and palpable, when he feels okay just because Hank is with him, he knows.

He _knows_. 

“Hey,” Hank says, voice weak, as he kneels by Connor’s bed and kisses his forehead. “Come on. Can you walk?”

Connor shakes his head.

“Okay,” Hank says. He’s good under pressure, Connor realizes all at once, collected even though he’s upset. “It’s okay. I’ve got you.” He goes to hoist Connor up, although his phone vibrates in his pocket and Connor taps it before he can.

“I love you,” Connor’s message says, and Hank gives him a sad smile and kisses his forehead when he reads it.

“I love you, too,” he says. “You’re going to be okay, baby.” 

Hank carries Connor down to his car, and Connor texts him again when he crosses to the driver’s side. “We have to go to CyberLife,” he writes.

“Yeah,” Hank replies as he starts the car. “I know.”

Connor would text him what he wants to say, but Hank knows just from looking at him. “I know you didn’t want to go back there,” he says. “I’ll stay with you the entire time, okay? I’ll be right there.”

Connor lifts his hand to reach for Hank’s, the way he always does in the car, but Hank is already lacing their fingers together.

Android repairs are odd these days - they don’t have a medical system anywhere near what exists for humans set up, but when they were granted their legal autonomy, they had to be provided with something akin to a hospital. For most cities, that’s a repair center that extended its hours to be open 24/7, either by choice or because it was mandated.

For Detroit, it’s CyberLife Tower - and in some ways, that’s good, because Connor is a unique model, and some of his biocomponents are built differently, and CyberLife technicians are the only ones who should really be working on him.

In other ways - in most ways - it just makes Connor feel like his luck is shit. He would rather take his chances with a repair center than return to the exact place that made him. 

But it’s after hours, and they’re all closed, so there’s nothing else to do. 

Connor texts Hank’s phone and says, “We should call ahead. Just in case. Tell them there’s internal thirium leakage in my neck and that it’s flooding my filtration system.”

Hank reads it, face ashen, and then he says, “How long should I tell them you have?” 

Connor looks at him and squeezes his fingers with the strength left in him, although it isn’t much. “Under four hours,” he writes back, and he isn’t imagining that Hank steps down harder on the gas when it comes through.

Connor sends CyberLife Tower’s repair center number to Hank’s phone for him, and Hank picks it up to make the call.

“Hi,” Hank says when the call connects. “I need to bring an android in for repairs - it’s critical. He was stabbed in the neck...yeah. Severe thirium leakage and flooding in his filtration system, four hours until shutdown...he’s an RK800.” 

“And what’s your name, sir?” Connor hears the woman on the other end of the line ask.

“Hank...last name is Anderson.” Hank hesitates, and then he says, “His name is Connor. If you need that.”

They don’t need it, Connor knows. They only need his model number. But he likes that Hank thinks of it anyway.

“Yeah,” Hank is saying. “We’re maybe twenty minutes away....Okay. We’ll do that...Thank you.”

Hank hangs up and squeezes Connor’s hand. “Okay,” he says. “They’re getting the supplies ready. They’re going to take you right back when we get there.”

Connor’s processors are running sluggishly with the errors and the malfunctioning biocomponents, and his thought processes are more difficult to control than usual. He gets stuck on a memory, a stupid, insignificant memory, of a CyberLife technician running him through his setup protocols after loading him into his new body after mark 52’s death.

There’s nothing terrible about it, objectively. They’re just sitting in a room, talking. Connor is answering questions. Calibrating.

But he feels dread fill him all the same. 

It’s just that CyberLife is where he began. And he’s always running from his roots, trying to figure out how to be something that spites them, or to shed them entirely.

He doesn’t want to remember, but even now, he’s stuck in a loop, one he can’t simply step out of.

He texts Hank and says, “Can you talk to me about something else?” 

“Yeah,” Hank says immediately. “You want to hear about work or about Sumo?”

“Sumo,” Connor writes back, and so Hank starts talking, filling the silence.

It gives Connor something else to focus on. It’s a way out of the labyrinth.

He closes his eyes, and he tries to make himself breathe.

(It’s difficult, given the circumstances. But his thoughts do gradually travel elsewhere - Hank’s voice is soothing, and there are only positive memories associated with Sumo. His thought processes spiral down on another loop, but this one he at least doesn’t mind.) 

And maybe it’s because he isn’t thinking clearly that Connor doesn’t consider the finances until they’re pulling up the drive, past the long abandoned security station. He sits up as best he can, looking at Hank with wide eyes. 

“I don’t have money for this,” he writes, because of course this won’t be free, and of course he’s a specialized model. “I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay,” Hank says as they pull into the lot. He parks in the emergency access lane - Connor doesn’t know if they told him he could do that over the phone, or if Hank just doesn’t care. “I‘ve got it.”

“It isn’t going to be cheap,” Connor writes back, but Hank just shrugs.

“You aren’t cheap. You won’t let me forget it.”

And if Connor could laugh, he would. He settles for squeezing Hank's hand instead, and Hank grasps him by the shoulder and leans across the console to kiss his forehead.

"Alright," he says softly. "Let's go, baby."

Connor tries to do what he can to make it easier for Hank to carry him, but his limbs are sluggish, and there isn't much he can do to shift his weight.

"You know you're heavier than you look?" Hank asks as they cross the sidewalk. "I think every romantic fantasy I ever had about carrying you to bed died tonight."

Connor knows from Hank's elevated pulse that he's afraid, that all of this, the joking around, the easygoing flirting, is all intentional and carefully calculated for his benefit.

Knowing it doesn't stop it from helping, though.

Connor texts him, even though Hank can't check his phone right now. "I can carry you instead," he offers, "although I think you're doing fine ;)"

Hank's phone vibrates in his pocket, and Hank squeezes Connor's side and says, "Is that something sarcastic?"

Connor just blinks at him with his best approximation of innocence. 

A technician meets them at the door like Hank was promised. He has what would look like a wheelchair with him, but it isn't one, or it isn't exactly. It's the same device CyberLife used to use to move androids in stasis from one room to another. 

Connor wishes he could walk.

The technician talks to Hank as they walk down the hall to the repair bay - and Connor remembers being there, too, although it was mark 51 and 52, there for biocomponent salvage after their destruction, and not him exactly.

He feels himself spiraling down again and forces an override, feeding himself the memories of his first date with Hank instead. They're patchy - his memory recall is malfunctioning with all of his processors directed towards alleviating stress on his damaged biocomponents - but it's better than nothing. 

It gets Hank's voice in his head, at least, like a lifeline.

Connor does a facial scan on the technician and realizes he worked here during Connor's development - Connor knows because he had access to CyberLife's company records and personnel files before the revolution, even if he never saw him personally. 

There was some considerable turnover after the revolution, and a change in leadership, but CyberLife had a monopoly on android production before androids had any autonomy, and that means they have a monopoly on android repair now. They're the only people who know how to do it, the only source producing biocomponents. The whole company should have gone under. In a perfect world, it would have been replaced with android-run shops, and maybe it will be, someday, when there's any chance in hell of an android having the finances to start a business. 

For now, though, most of the technicians and programmers who built him as a machine are still gainfully employed while androids have had to cut corners, and CyberLife is alive and well, like a cockroach.

And Connor hates that. 

"Okay, Connor," the technician says when they get back to the repair bay. "I'm going to have you go into stasis, alright? Then we'll load you up."

Connor looks at Hank and shakes his head.

"You're going to feel all of it if you don't, bud," the technician says, which makes Connor desperately wish he could talk just so he could respond to the patronizing tone.

"Hey," Hank says, kneeling in front of Connor and touching his face while the technician gets the machine ready (and the machine is the same, too, that horrible thing that will take him by the limbs and suspend him midair. Androids don't lie on beds for repairs because it would hurt the technicians' necks to bend over them - human comfort is always the concern.)

"Connor. Baby," Hank says just as Connor feels himself getting stuck in a loop again. "You can go into stasis, okay? I'll be right here. I'll make sure nothing happens."

Connor doesn't want to, and not because he doesn't trust Hank, but because he distrusts all the rest of this so thoroughly, whether it's a rational fear or not. 

"Hey," Hank says when Connor doesn't say anything, "don't make me watch this with you awake, okay? I don't have that in me."

It's probably the only thing that would get Connor to cave, because he's always sworn to himself that if CyberLife ever worked on him again, he would at least stay awake. Stasis is inherently vulnerable, and his pain tolerance is higher than any human's - it would hurt like hell, but not in a way he couldn't take.

Hank is still watching him, so he nods, and Hank kisses his hair, relieved. "Love you," Hank whispers, and Connor tucks his forehead into the crook of his neck and nods against him.

"I love you, too," he texts back.

Hank lays a hand over his phone in his pocket when it vibrates. "I know you do," he says without checking it. He squeezes Connor’s arm. “Lights out, baby. I’ll see you when you wake up and you have your smart mouth back.”

“You love my smart mouth,” Connor texts him, and then he looks at Hank, ignores the repair bay and the technician and everything else, and shuts himself down. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

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> Come chat with me!


	4. the loudest of all sounds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Healing comes slowly, and it comes in waves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title from Mutual Benefit's "Sinking Stone":
> 
> _Love is the loudest of all sounds  
>  It's the hum in the air, it's the dirge from the ground  
> You've got a hold over me  
> Until my world disappears and you're all I see_

“You really don’t have to stay,” the technician says to Hank once Connor is in stasis. “The waiting room is more comfortable - that’s where most of their people go when they come in with them.”

Hank shrugs. “It’s eleven at night and this is going to cost half of my savings. I’m not here to be comfortable, you know?”

“Suit yourself.” 

The repair bay is stark and austere in the same way a hospital is, but that’s about where the similarities stop. The wheelchair Connor is in is mechanical - when the technician presses something on his panel, the seat of it lifts up so he can transfer Connor into the repair dock.

“You ever seen inside his chassis before?” the technician asks as he attaches the cables to Connor’s neck port and fastens the cuffs to his wrists.

Hank crosses his arms and raises an eyebrow, because it seems like an intrusive question, and the technician gets the hint. 

“I just mean I’m going to have to open his chest cavity to get at his filtration system, and some people find that disturbing. They forget they’re machines, you know? And then they get themselves all unsettled.” 

“I’m not going to get upset. I know he’s not human.”

It is strange, watching the technician open Connor’s chest cavity, and Hank can see why it might be unsettling. But mostly what he notices is Connor’s thirium pump, and how it’s on the left side of his chest, how he can see it beating there like any human heart.

He can see the thirium leakage, too, staining his insides blue with an oil-like sheen. He tries to ignore that as the technician examines the cut veins and wiring, checking his phone instead and smiling at Connor’s messages. 

“Huh,” the technician says a few minutes later. “He a smoker?”

“Oh.” Hank looks up. “Yeah. He is.”

“Thought so. There’s all kinds of residue in his filtration system.” The technician shakes his head, letting out a low whistle. “A lot of them do that these days. Machines with anxiety - who would have thought?”

He says it like he might think it’s a joke, and Hank doesn’t care for that at all, nor does he dignify it with a response.

The technician gets to work pulling some of the wiring for replacement, and though Hank keeps an eye on it like he promised Connor he would, he figures he ought to call Jeff if he wants to keep his job.

Jeff picks up on the first ring. “Hank, what the fuck?” he says when he does. “Is everything okay? You just bailed.”

“Yeah,” Hank says. “Sorry. It was an emergency. Connor needed critical repairs, and there isn’t exactly an android ambulance in operation yet.”

“Connor,” Jeff repeats. “Jesus, I didn’t realize you were still dating him. I thought you just brought him to the awards ceremony to prove a point.” 

“I told you we were dating,” Hank says, even though they weren’t exactly at the time Connor and Jeff met. He would be offended, but if Jeff doesn’t think he could get Connor after three years of only going to work and the bar, he can understand why. He frankly still doesn’t know how he did it himself.

“Yeah,” Jeff says. “I guess you did. Is he going to be okay?”

“I think so. They just need to replace some things. We’re at CyberLife now. I’m probably going to be in late tomorrow, but I was supposed to be off Sunday, and I can come in then to make up for the hours.”

“That’s fine,” Jeff says. He pauses a moment, and Hank is about to say he should go, when Jeff adds, “It’s been a month since the awards ceremony.”

“Yeah? What’s your point?”

“That’s pretty serious by your standards, especially the last few years.”

“Oh,” Hank says, glancing up at Connor’s face. “I mean... yeah. It’s serious.”

“Good for you,” Jeff says. “Tell him I said hello, and...sorry for the circumstances, I guess.” 

“I will,” Hank says, and he thinks all at once that maybe he’ll put a picture of him and Connor up on his desk when he gets back to work. He’s never liked most of his personal life there, because it hurt when things blew apart before and everyone at work knew about it. 

People meant well, asking how he was doing, but it turned work into one more reminder of everything he’d lost.

He isn’t going to lose Connor, though. He can put the picture up.

“And Hank,” Jeff says, “next time, at least tell me you’re leaving. You’re...” 

“Yeah,” Hank says. “I know. I’m on thin fucking ice.”

“Right,” Jeff says, but there’s a well-masked smile in his voice that Hank recognizes after years of friendship. “Take care, Hank.”

“Bye, Jeff. Thanks,” Hank says, and he means for everything.

The repairs are a time-consuming process. Hank watches quietly while the technician repairs the severed veins and wires, and then moves on to the filtration unit. He mostly works in silence - maybe Hank made it evident enough that he wasn’t interested in conversation, or maybe he just doesn’t have as much to say now that he’s working.

Hank could scroll through his phone to pass the time, he supposes, but he doesn’t. He and Connor are in this together, and he feels like that means, at least in part, bearing some kind of witness to this. He can’t get Connor down off that machine until this is over, and he can’t take his place, but he can watch it, even if that isn’t taking any of it from Connor.

“Hey,” Hank says at some point, when the technician looks like he’s finishing up. It’s been hours - it’s almost two in the morning. “I didn’t say anything about it on the phone, but the plating of his chassis is damaged, on his side. Can you fix that?”

The technician leans over and types a command into his terminal that pulls Connor’s synth-skin back over his entire torso. “Oh, yeah,” he says when he sees it. “I can fix it, but it’s going to be another five thousand or so, plus the after hours fee. That’s charged per individual repair.”

“Yeah,” Hank says. “That’s fine.” He knows Connor will tell him it isn’t worth it, that he’s aware of it but it doesn’t hurt, that it’s too expensive to justify for a cosmetic repair, but he also doesn’t want Connor to have to come back here. Getting it fixed won’t remove the memories - nothing will - but he at least shouldn’t have to carry it like a brand anymore. 

“Okay,” the technician says. “Let me go grab a compatible plate from the lab. I’ll be right back. You want me to bring him back online a while?”

Hank hesitates, mostly because he just wants to do this for Connor, and because if he wakes up, Connor will give him shit about it. 

The technician must see him considering it, because he says, “Yeah,” without Hank saying anything, like he’s in on some secret. “Rumor always had it that his model was kind of a piece of work. It’s the advanced social programming, you know? He’s the first one we built who really grasped the concept of sarcasm and dry humor. The guys in development used to say he was kind of...well. Bitchy.”

“You can wake him up, actually,” Hank says, cutting him off a little with a voice that comes out clipped, because he’s allowed to fondly call Connor a piece of work and a brat and anything in between, but this asshole isn’t. “I’ll talk to him about it.” 

The technician shrugs. “Whatever you want.” He inputs another command in his terminal, and then hits a button that detaches the cable in Connor’s neck port. The suspension unit lowers him back to the ground before the cuffs release him. “He’ll come back online in thirty seconds. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

Hank doesn’t thank him, because he might think Connor is ‘bitchy’, but Connor also isn’t the only one with the capacity for it.

Thirty seconds is a long time to wait in nothing but silence, but Connor’s LED does cycle back to blue, and his eyes do flutter open eventually. It’s like any other time he’s come out of stasis - it takes him maybe a second to calibrate, but he’s immediately aware, just as he always is.

“Hey,” Hank says when Connor looks at him, and Connor throws himself into Hank’s arms.

“Hi,” he whispers.

Hank smiles, tears pricking his eyes, and kisses his hair. “I missed your voice.”

“That’s very sappy, Hank,” Connor says, but Hank can hear him smiling, and the relief in his voice. “Are we done?” He sounds tired, worn out, and Hank thinks about carrying him out to the car, even if he’s stable to walk again, and just driving him home.

If Connor asked him to, he would.

“I asked,” Hank starts, “and they can repair your chassis tonight, if you want. I don’t want you to have to come back here, and if you want to leave it the way it is, I’ll respect that, but I want to have it done for you...if you’ll let me.”

Connor still hasn’t let go of him, so Hank can’t judge his reaction from his face. “I told you I didn’t want you to pay for that,” he says into Hank’s neck. His tone is neutral enough, at least.

“What you said, actually, was that you didn’t want a client to pay for it,” Hank says, poking his undamaged side. “I thought maybe your boyfriend could.”

Connor is quiet for a long time, long enough that Hank starts to worry the technician will come back before he can answer. But he finally does whisper, “Is this going to bankrupt you?” 

“I’ve had a good job and a cheap house and no social life for the last few years,” Hank says. He lifts a hand to the back of Connor’s neck, stroking his thumb through the clipped hair there. “No, it’s not going to bankrupt me.”

It  _ is _ going to stop him from being able to gift Connor the few hundred dollars a week he has for the last month, and that means Connor is going to have to take on another client to stay in his apartment...unless…

But they can talk about that later.

Connor goes quiet again, and very still against him. And then, finally, he says, “Okay. But I’m not going back into stasis for it. I didn’t like that.”

“You don’t have to,” Hank says into his hair. “It’ll be quick, and then we can go home.” 

Connor pulls away far enough to look at him, and Hank puts his hands on his face when he does, because he just wants to touch him and reassure himself that he’s okay. “Can you stay at my place tonight?” Connor asks in a small voice.

Connor’s relationship with his apartment fluctuates, Hank has noticed. Sometimes he seems to hate it, and sometimes he doesn’t. 

(When he’s trying to remind himself that he’s alive, and that he’s built something for himself, even if it’s just small right now, he doesn’t.)

“Yeah,” Hank says without giving it a second thought. He already had the dog walker stop by and let Sumo out when he realized he would be working late. “Sure, baby.” 

The relief on Connor’s face could break Hank’s heart, and when Hank kisses him again, it’s as much for him as it is for Connor. He’s not too proud to admit that.

“Alright,” the technician says when he returns. He’s still talking to Hank, even though Connor is awake, and maybe it’s a difficult habit to break if you’ve spent years working with androids and treating them like machines, but it still rubs Hank the wrong way. “He can go back under or just sit in the chair for this.”

“Why the fuck are you asking me?” Hank wants to say, but Connor grasps his arm and says, “I’ll stay awake.”

“Sit here for me and pull your synthskin back,” the technician says, gesturing to the wheelchair.

Connor shrugs out of his unbuttoned shirt - he looks unsure of himself, and like he has the inclination to fold the shirt just for something to do with his hands, but it’s ruined anyway, so Hank just gently takes it from him and tucks it over his arm.

Connor gives him a weak smile and goes to sit in the chair, letting his synthskin recede over his torso.

“I’m going to pop this plate off,” the technician says. “It shouldn’t hurt, but it is going to feel weird.”

Connor nods, and Hank moves behind him to grasp his shoulder while the technician unscrews the damaged plate.

Connor flinches when he removes it, but it looks more like discomfort than pain - it has to affect the way his weight is distributed, and maybe it feels odd to have his biocomponents exposed to the open air, too.

Hank squeezes his shoulder, and Connor reaches up to grasp his fingers. He turns his head to press his cheek into the back of Hank’s hand, looking away from the repair as he does.

Hank gets his phone out and texts with one hand so he doesn’t have to let go of Connor’s shoulder. “You okay?”

“It doesn’t hurt,” Connor’s reply says. “I just don’t like this. Being worked on, I mean. I don’t like it.”

“I know,” Hank writes back. “You’re doing so good, though. And we’ll be home soon.”

Connor nods, his cheek brushing the back of Hank’s hand, and Hank squeezes his shoulder again.

The technician finishes fastening the new plate into place, and then he claps Connor’s side like he’s a car and he’s just finished working on the engine and closed the hood. “Alright,” he says. “Good as new. Watch the smoking, or you two will be back here again in a few years.”

Again, he says it to Hank and not Connor. Hank thinks about saying something, but he doesn’t want to make a scene, and he doesn’t think Connor would appreciate one either.

Instead, he wraps an arm around Connor’s shoulders once he’s finished pulling his damaged shirt on, kisses his hair so the technician can see, because if he isn’t going to tell him off or chew him out, then he’s going to at least make sure he sees Hank treating Connor like what he actually is.

Maybe it’ll get through to him. Probably it won’t. 

But the entire repair process has been dehumanizing - it’s built that way by design - so it’s to spite the technician, but it’s for Connor’s benefit, too.

“Come on, sweetheart,” Hank says to Connor, and Connor sinks into him and doesn’t look back.

It’s fifteen thousand dollars and change for the repair - Hank has to transfer money out of his savings account to cover it entirely, and he regrets very much that he didn’t suggest Connor wait in the car a while while he pays. He doesn’t want Connor to feel indebted to him for this, or even to have a price on it at all.

“What happens if an android doesn’t have the money for repairs?” Connor softly asks the woman at the front desk as she prints Hank’s receipt.

“We’ll still treat them if they come in,” the woman says. “We’ll just put them on a payment plan.”

“Sounds familiar,” Hank says dryly. “Can they afford that, even?”

“If they fall behind on their payments, we usually just set up a wage garnishment so it will come out of their paycheck. Most of them don’t have one right now, but it will apply when they do.”

“ _ Cool _ ,” Hank says dryly. It’s effectively bankrupting them before they even have any money, and he can’t begin to say how pissed off he is about it. 

Connor looks around the lobby as the receptionist hands Hank his receipt. “Fuck this place,” he says softly, a disdainful curl to his lip.

“Have a nice night,” the receptionist says, in a way that implies she doesn’t hope they have a nice night at all.

Hank couldn’t begin to care less.

Connor pats his suit jacket down when they get to the car with increasing desperation. “Fuck,” he mutters. “My cigarettes must have fallen out in the scuffle.”

“It’s okay,” Hank says as he climbs into the driver’s seat and starts the car. He wishes Connor wouldn’t smoke right away with the new filtration unit, but he bites his tongue fucking hard before he says anything. He knows why Connor needs them, and he doesn’t want to seem like he thinks he has some sort of right to tell Connor what he can and can’t do with his body just because he’s paid for his repairs.

“Take my hand, okay?” Hank says instead, reaching across the console. “Focus on my hand. We’ll be home soon.”

Connor does, threading their fingers together - Hank can plainly feel the nervous energy in him. They pull out of the lot in silence, and it isn’t until they’re on the highway that Hank says, “Do you want to talk about what happened?”

“There’s nothing to talk about, really,” Connor says softly. “He didn’t like that a tin can was dressed in a nice suit. He told me to give him my money, I said no, he hit me, I hit harder. I tried to get around him and go back inside, but he pulled the knife, and there wasn’t a way for me to deflect it without breaking his arm or doing something worse. I could have done that, but what good would it have done?” Connor shrugs. “It was easier if I just let it happen.”

“Did you get a name? Do you want to press charges?”

Connor is quiet for a moment, and then he says, “Yeah. I have a name.” He taps his temple. “Facial recognition software.”

“Okay,” Hank says. “Then I can...”

Connor squeezes his hand. “You can’t. I love you, but you can’t bring him in. I hurt him, too.”

“Yeah, in self-defense. And nowhere near what he did to you.”

“Hank,” Connor says, quiet and sad, “he hurt me, and I hurt him, and those two things are supposed to be equally illegal these days, but they aren’t.” He sighs, pushing a hand through his hair. “They just aren’t. Okay?”

“Connor...”

“I know you want to make this right,” Connor says, “but you can’t. He’s from an affluent family with a last name everyone knows, and the last thing I need, or that Markus needs while he’s trying to do some good for us in D.C., is news outlets picking this up and using it to harvest fear. You know they’ll spin this so he looks sympathetic and androids look like something to be afraid of. I don’t want that. I just want to drop it.”

And Hank feels so fucking helpless, but he gets it. He does. He has to just say, “Okay.”

They sit in silence for a few minutes, everything hanging heavy between them. Hank thinks about asking Connor for the name anyway, and he thinks Connor even trusts him enough that he would give it to him, but what good would it do? He sees every last one of Connor’s points, so there’s no reason for him to know the man’s identity, for it to sit there like a temptation for him, a way he might betray Connor’s trust if he thinks about it too hard and lets himself get pissed off enough.

Connor is right - it’s better this way.

So the silence stretches between them, and Hank squeezes Connor’s fingers and lifts their joined hands to kiss the back of Connor’s. Connor is trying not to fidget, it’s plain, but he’s still fussing with the edges of his jacket sleeve with his free hand, all anxious energy no matter how he tries to quell it in himself.

“Do you want to stop somewhere for cigarettes?” Hank asks softly. It’s enabling, maybe, but he doesn’t like seeing Connor like this, and he doesn’t know what else to do.

Connor shakes his head. “I should try to quit. Damaging the new unit with the same old bad habit isn’t a great way to thank you.”

“I don’t know. I think it would be okay if you started trying tomorrow...if that’s what you want to do at all. It doesn’t have to be.”

Connor’s face softens, and he leans across the console to kiss Hank’s cheek. “You’re sweet,” he says. “It’s okay. I want to. I’ve been wanting to.”

They pull into Connor’s lot, and Hank catches a hand on Connor’s hair and kisses him as soon as he puts the car in park.

“I’m proud of you,” he says, and Connor tilts his head and gives him a small smile.

“For what?”

For all of it, really. For standing up for himself, and then standing down for the rest of his people, for being brave enough and clever enough to want to just let this go. For trying to quit something that makes his life so much more tolerable when his thoughts get loud the way they tend to, or when he’s starting to spiral down.

“I just think you’re incredible,” he settles for saying, and for all he’s been through this evening, for all the ways tonight hurt, Connor still looks pleased, the way he always does when he’s told he did well.

“Come on,” Connor says, pulling away from Hank and reaching for the passenger door. “I’m tired.”

When they step into the lobby, Connor points out the bathroom since there isn’t one in his unit, and when they get upstairs, he starts wordlessly shrugging out of his suit, leaving it in an unfolded heap on the floor.

He removed his LED for his date earlier, but Hank watches him put it back in now. And that’s incredible too, Hank thinks, a quiet act of resistance or bravery, because Connor was just targeted for what he is, and he’s still putting the identifying mark back in when he could so easily let it out.

When Connor is stripped down to his briefs, he turns his bed down and climbs under the covers, and Hank doesn’t waste much time joining him.

It’s cold as fuck in Connor’s apartment - another consequence of the building not being zoned for human occupancy - but the covers are thick, and Connor is warm when Hank climbs into bed beside him and draws him back against his chest.

“Can you talk to me?” Connor asks, voice muffled by his pillow.

“Yeah, sweetheart. What do you want to talk about?”

“I don’t know. Something happy.”

So Hank talks about nothing - his childhood, his parents, stupid things he did in high school when he thought he was hot shit - and he gets a few soft laughs out of Connor that way before he slips into stasis.

He doesn’t stay there long. Not even long enough for Hank to fall asleep beside him. His LED spins red the entire time - Connor told him that first night they spent together that this was just something that happened in stasis, and it is, but Hank also knows now that red means nightmares. He wonders what Connor’s programming is feeding him, if it’s something from November or if it’s making him relive tonight, but either way, there isn’t much more he can do than wrap his arms around him and hold him close and hope Connor knows he’s there.

It doesn’t stop Connor from waking up again an hour later. He doesn’t function like a human that way, Hank knows - he never wakes up involuntarily the way a human might from an unsettling dream. He could stay in stasis if he wanted, but he’s choosing to bring himself out, because sometimes sitting awake with his thoughts is better than being asleep and having no control over them.

Hank is still awake when Connor’s LED circles from red to yellow - a telltale sign he’s back online, even if he doesn’t move and Hank can’t see his face.

“Hey,” Hank says, stroking his side. “You okay?”

Connor shakes his head. He turns his face into the pillow, and Hank can hear him taking a few breaths, trying to center himself. “I can’t,” he whispers. “I’m so fucking tired, but I can’t.”

“Okay,” Hank says. “I’ll sit up with you.”

“I just want to calibrate the new biocomponents so they don’t feel so foreign,” Connor whispers, and he sounds on the verge of tears, pitiful enough that Hank really fucking hates that he can’t do anything more.

“It’s okay,” he says, kissing the back of Connor’s neck. It’s not, but what else can he say?

Connor shivers against him, and he’s quiet for a moment. Hank is about to ask him if he wants to sit up and watch a movie or a show or something when Connor takes him by the wrist and brings his fingers to his mouth.

“Connor...” Hank starts, but Connor reaches back with his free hand and opens his neck port, and he’s asked Hank to help him in this way when his thoughts are too intrusive before.

Hank doesn’t need to be asked any more clearly. 

He kisses the shell of Connor’s ear and whispers, “Okay. I’ve got you, baby.”

Connor just sinks his teeth the slightest bit into Hank’s fingers, gentle even if his meaning is clear that he’s impatient.

Hank grasps Connor by the chin with the fingers he has free and tilts Connor’s head to kiss his temple, and then he traces the rim of Connor’s neck port before he reaches inside and plucks at one of the wires.

The noise Connor makes is muffled by Hank’s fingers in his mouth, but it’s no less pretty for it.

Hank can always tell when Connor is strung tight, when he’s asking for this because he needs it and not just because it’s what he wants, but he’s still never seen him like he is tonight, rigid and desperate.

So he doesn’t go slow. He pushes his fingers through the wires in Connor’s neck port until he brushes his spine with its familiar metal ridges. Usually that’s enough to do it, to at least start overloading him if it doesn’t work entirely, and Connor does bite down on his fingers, he does moan around them, but it’s plain he’s still distracted and preoccupied. 

Hank does it again, and Connor whines, but Hank can’t get him centered on this the way he usually can with little effort, can’t seem to tear the rest of Connor’s world down and rebuild it with himself at the center, even if it’s only for a few minutes before the rest of it seeps back in.

Hank pulls his fingers from Connor’s mouth - it takes effort, and Connor tries to sink his teeth in to resist, but Hank is persistent, because as much as he wishes he knew without asking, and as much as he feels like he does sometimes, he needs Connor to guide him here, and so he needs his mouth free.

“Baby,” Hank says in Connor’s ear, voice pitched low the way he knows Connor likes. “I need you to tell me what you need, okay? I want to help you, but I don’t know how.”

Connor shakes his head, a touch frantic. “I don’t know,” he whispers into his pillow, and he sounds so frustrated that Hank actually aches. “I can’t stop thinking. I’m trying...”

There’s an apologetic note to his voice that breaks Hank’s heart, because he knows Connor needs approval, and that he worries about losing it. He kisses him quiet, strokes his fingers gently through the wires in his neck until he feels Connor relax against him the smallest bit.

“It’s okay,” Hank says against the hot skin of his temple. “You’re okay. I’ve got you.”

It was a mistake, maybe, asking Connor to think when thinking is the entire problem. But it’s okay. He can figure this out - he can improvise. Connor may be built differently than him, but what he needs, the fundamentals of it, are similar.

In this moment, he needs to surrender. And if getting Hank inside his very being isn’t enough...

“Connor,” he says, “you trust me, don’t you?”

Connor nods. His jaw is clenched tight, and Hank can hear him swallow.

“Good,” Hank whispers. “Then disable your ocular processing for me.”

Connor looks over his shoulder, a bit of a question on his face, and Hank kisses that little furrow in his brow.

“I don’t want you to see what I’m going to do to you, and I’d get one of your ties to blindfold you, but it’s cold as fuck in here.” Hank kisses him again. “Can you do that for me?”

“Yes,” Connor whispers.

“Good. Tell me when it’s done.”

Hank knows when it is before Connor says anything, though, from the way his eyes unfocus the smallest bit. He kisses Connor approvingly and says, “Thank you, sweetheart.”

“Hank,” Connor whines, less frustrated and more desperate.

It’s a good start.

“Shh,” Hank breathes, chuckling as Connor shivers when he dips his fingers under the waistband of his briefs and traces the curve of his hip. Connor shifts, trying to guide Hank’s hand to his cock, but Hank pulls back when he does.

“Hank,” Connor says, pleading and clipped like his voice gets when he’s impatient.

Hank dips a fingernail into one of the ridges in Connor’s spine, tracing the outline slowly, and even without his vision, Connor throws a disapproving glance in his direction for the tease.

“Please fuck me,” he whispers, and Hank smiles.

“I will, sweetheart, but not yet. I’m going to focus on you until I have your undivided attention.”

“I’m trying,” Connor whines, tossing his head in frustration. 

“I know. You’re doing so good. I’ll help you.”

Hank has never seen the little collection, but he does know what Connor keeps in his bedside table. He runs a hand over his side before he pulls away, leaning over and reaching for the drawer.

If Hank delights a little too much in the way Connor goes very still at the sound of it opening, he’ll never tell.

Connor looks at him as Hank roots through the toys in the drawer, right at him - his auditory processors are advanced, built to triangulate sound with frightening accuracy. Hank knows that, and so he has no delusions at all that he can really surprise Connor here.

Connor still knows  _ exactly _ what he's doing, of course he does, but he's focusing so much harder in the absence of his vision, pinning every last one of his senses on Hank, and that's good.

That's what helps, narrowing his world down to a single point, and Hank isn't sure he'll ever entirely understand that he's the one who can do this, that he can occupy so much of Connor's relatively unlimited attention, but he's endlessly flattered by it all the same.

He glances over his shoulder at Connor, finds his chest rising and falling in steady rhythm, his eyes narrowed as he concentrates on what Hank is doing.

If the circumstances were any different, Hank would ask Connor what he's looking at in the small collection, because the assortment of toys is recognizable but different. They're android specific, all of them, and who knows in what sort of weird, fucky ways they might interact with Connor's systems or intercept his processes.

"Are there any of these you don't like?" Hank asks - it gives him some guidance without letting Connor pick.

Connor shakes his head, lips parted as he breathes. "No," he whispers.

Hank opens a little case, finding something that looks familiar enough inside, a modest-sized plug and a little remote.

There's recognition on Connor's face, Hank realizes - he knows what Hank has from the sound of the case opening - but his breathing also picks up along with it, and that's affirmation enough. Hank doesn't care nearly as much about surprising him as he does about overwhelming him.

"Good choice?" Hank asks as he settles back at Connor's side, wrapping an arm around him, and Connor swallows hard and nods.

"Yes.”

Hank kisses the skin under his ear. "Take your underwear off for me?"

Connor moves to do as Hank asks, hooking his thumbs under the waistband of his briefs and slipping them from his legs. He reaches back for Hank's boxers, too, but Hank catches him gently by the wrist.

"Not yet, baby," he says, even if he's so fucking hard and he knows he'll find Connor wet with his artificial lubricant, that he could just sink into him right now.

He wants to, but he has to keep his focus to help Connor lose his.

Connor's lack of sight doesn't stop him from throwing a scowl rather perfectly in Hank's direction, and Hank laughs and kisses the curve of his shoulder. He reaches a hand between Connor's legs, ghosting the pad of his finger over Connor's hole - he isn't surprised to find him slick and ready. He usually is - Hank knows he has full control of the protocol, but he's always impatient, and Hank loves that about him.

He presses the tip of the plug against Connor's hole, kisses his neck as he works it into him and taps the base of it when it sits flush against him, fully nestled inside him. Hank can feel Connor's thirium pump working under his hand even if the rest of him has gone very still. 

Hank doesn't move, either. He waits, makes Connor focus on him to try to hear him moving, presses a light kiss but nothing more to the rim of his neck port and holds the little remote in his hand.

"Hank," Connor finally hisses.

And that's when Hank forces his fingers through the wires to Connor's spine and turns the remote on to the highest setting.

It does something Hank doesn't realize, maybe, because Connor comes immediately with a strangled cry, untouched beyond Hank's fingers in his port. He bites Hank's arm where it's threaded under his neck, breathing hard, and Hank turns the remote off and wraps his other arm around him, stroking his side.

"Okay?" he asks.

"Yes." Connor releases Hank's arm, breathing hard through his nose for a moment. And then he squeezes Hank's hand and whispers, "Again."

“Before I turn this on again,” Hank says, tapping the back of Connor’s hand with the remote, “what does this do?”

“It’s a vibrator,” Connor says. It’s the loftiest, most primly innocent tone Hank has ever heard someone use when talking about a sex toy.

“Mhm,” Hank says. “And?”

Connor squeezes his fingers. “And it interacts directly with my pleasure sensors. Very aggressively, on the top setting.”

“Yeah. I got that,” Hank laughs, kissing Connor’s hair. “You’re so amazing, you know that?”

“No,” Connor whispers. “Tell me.”

It’s an easy request to fulfill, honestly, and one Hank probably would have granted even without Connor asking. He can’t imagine having Connor like this and  _ not _ telling him how incredible he is, how beautiful he is when he comes apart, how much Hank loves him, because of course he does, so much.

He turns the remote to the lowest setting this time, plucks at Connor’s pebbled nipple with one hand and a wire he knows well in his port with the other, and Connor might be forcing himself to stay quiet, but his body sings for Hank anyway, the way it’s pulled taut like a string, the muscles quivering in his belly and the quiet thud of his thirium pump.

“You’re so gorgeous,” Hank tells Connor, voice pitched low in his ear. He tells him so much, but he also isn’t always sure Connor knows,  _ really  _ knows, even if he did tell Hank that first night that he knows he’s attractive. “Someday I’m going to fuck you in front of a mirror so you can see what I see.”

Connor whines, and Hank turns the plug up another setting and reaches for Connor’s cock where it lies flushed and leaking against his thigh. He gives it a slow stroke and taps the remote against Connor’s hand. “Are you paying attention, baby?”

“Yes,” Connor whispers, and he looks at the remote even though he can’t see it, like he knows Hank’s thumb is on the control. “Do it.”

Hank flips it again, because he’ll always do whatever Connor says, always, and he pulls Connor back against him when he comes again in Hank’s fist, stroking him through it.

It’s dirty, maybe, but that doesn’t stop Hank from bringing his fingers to his mouth and sucking Connor’s taste from them. Connor goes very still when he does - he’s trying to catch his breath, but he’s also listening.

“I want to taste you,” Connor whispers as he does.

It should have occurred to Hank sooner, maybe - he’s been thinking about fucking him, but Connor’s most sensitive components are in his mouth.

“Yeah,” Hank says, voice rough. “Okay. One more?”

Connor nods, a bit desperate, and Hank can’t help kissing him slow and tender, even if he knows Connor’s patience is a thin line sometimes.

Connor lets him, though, twists in his arms and sinks into him and kisses him back, and Hank holds him as tight as he can for a moment before he maneuvers him onto his back.

“You trust me?” he asks again.

Connor nods. He doesn’t think about it at all. “Always.”

Hank takes Connor’s arms and extends them at his sides. “Stay still,” he whispers against Connor’s LED before he moves.

He can hear Connor breathing as he sits up and climbs astride his chest, placing his knees on Connor’s arms to pin him down.

“Okay?” he asks, and Connor nods, swallowing thickly. “Here,” Hank says, pressing the remote into Connor’s hand. “Give yourself whatever you need.”

And then he fists his hand in Connor’s hair, gentle but firm, and lifts his head enough that he can easily press the tip of his cock to Connor’s mouth.

Connor parts his lips so Hank can slip inside, moaning around him, and Hank braces his hand on Connor’s headboard and smiles when he hears the remote click on. He rocks into Connor’s mouth once, experimentally, looking down at Connor’s face and Connor’s lips stretched around him, and Connor looks back at him.

Even without his vision, Hank knows he sees him. Connor always sees him.

Connor tries to bob his head after a moment - he can’t move much with Hank’s fingers still closed around his hair, but Hank can take a hint all the same, even if he could look at Connor like this for so much longer.

He pulls his hips back a few inches, already groaning at the feel of Connor’s lips wet and tight and perfect around him, and then he sinks back in.

Hank doesn’t look away from Connor - he wouldn’t know how to if he tried. It’s almost intoxicating, watching him like this - he’s single-minded in his dedication to the task, and he doesn’t need to breathe, and can’t choke...Hank wishes he knew what this felt like to Connor with how differently his mouth is built, but it’s enough to know that Connor loves this.

Hank pushes his fingers through Connor’s hair as he sinks down, gets him to open his eyes and meet his gaze.

“You’re so good,” Hank whispers in a low voice. The words come almost unbidden at this point...Connor might dislike the line of code in his programming that makes praise so important to him, but Hank loves giving it to him, loves being somewhere safe for Connor to have that need met. “Fuck, baby, look at you. You’re so incredible.”

Connor bobs his head, taking Hank’s cock to the back of his mouth and then an inch further, and Hank watches as he reaches up and touches his own throat, like he’s trying to feel Hank there...

“You want to come again?” Hank asks him, reaching for Connor’s hand where he’s grasping the remote and squeezing it when Connor nods around him. Hank brushes Connor’s hair from his forehead and makes his voice soft like a kiss when he says, “Do it, honey.”

He hears the click of the remote and feels Connor moan around him a moment later, eyes fluttering closed.

It’s a relief that Connor is starting to look exhausted and overwhelmed, that it takes him a moment of holding Hank still in his mouth for him to collect himself afterwards. Hank strokes Connor’s cheek while he waits and says, “One more, baby. You can give me one more, can’t you?”

Connor opens his eyes, and they’re burning with it when he moves on Hank’s cock again, his meaning clear even if he doesn’t nod. Hank knows he can’t back down from a challenge. He fists a hand in Connor’s hair again, gentle yet firm the way Connor likes, but he lets Connor set the pace.

(Because that’s the thing, isn’t it? Even when Hank takes control, Connor never loses it. Hank wouldn’t let him.)

It doesn’t take long. Connor is determined to drive Hank over the edge, and he does so with a machine precision that Hank will never be able to stand up against. Hank pulls back a few inches when it builds, muscles tightening, so he’s on Connor’s tongue, on all those sensitive little analysis units...

Connor flips the remote again and comes apart with a weak sound when Hank’s cock twitches in his mouth, pulls his arm free from under Hank’s knee and grasps for Hank’s fingers with his other hand when Hank spills in his mouth. Connor moans softly, swallowing around him while Hank pants over him for a moment before he pulls free and rolls back over to lie at Connor’s side.

Connor is overstimulated and oversensitive - Hank can tell from the dazed look on his face as he stares up at the ceiling, synthskin receding to reveal white plastic in the places where Hank was touching him and not immediately pulling back into place the way it should. He reaches for Hank’s hand, movements imprecise, and Hank catches him by the wrist and kisses him. He gently pries the remote from Connor’s fingers, and then turns him over onto his side so he can slip the toy from inside him and set it aside on the nightstand.

Hank kisses Connor’s shoulder and says, “You want to try to go to sleep again?”

When Connor looks over his shoulder at him, he has his ocular processing on again - Hank can mostly just tell from the way his pupils dilate when they focus on him. “Yes,” he says softly. “Thank you.”

Hank gathers him up and kisses his hair, and then his LED where it finally cycles a calm blue, and then his mouth. “I love you,” he whispers when Connor settles against his chest.

“Love you,” Connor echoes, and Hank can feel his little smile against his skin.

He’s in stasis a minute later. Hank stays up, but Connor doesn’t wake again.

In the morning, Connor wakes up at 6:59 precisely and reaches over to disable the alarm on Hank’s cell phone, the way he always does. (He’s a good enough alarm clock on his own, he usually says, and Hank will admit it’s a far more pleasant experience waking up to Connor kissing him than anything else.)

“You could have slept,” Connor says, settling back against Hank’s chest and fitting himself under Hank’s arm.

Hank shrugs. “Yeah. I know. I just felt like watching you.”

Connor smiles, the sleepy, lopsided one that Hank loves so much. “What time do you have to go in?”

“By noon, probably.” Hank squeezes Connor’s shoulder. “You going to be okay?”

Connor nods against him. He hesitates a moment, and then he says, “Can I hang out at your place while you’re at work?”

Hank has offered before, but Connor has never taken him up on it. “Yeah,” he says. “Sumo would like that.”

“I’m going to beat all your high scores on all those old arcade games you have on your console.”

“Hey,” Hank says, a weak protest, and Connor grins and kisses him. It’s a relief, Connor being a bit more himself. “You know you can stay there while I’m at work any time, don’t you?”

“Yeah,” Connor says softly. “I’m just scared that if I do, I won’t want to leave.”

Hank’s breath catches in his throat, and maybe Connor hears it, because he lifts his head and looks at him with an eyebrow raised. “It’s just,” Hank says. “You could, you know. You could just not leave.”

Connor kisses him, although it’s tinged with a hint of sadness now. “I know,” he whispers. “Can we talk about this later, maybe?”

Hank knows what Connor is going to say - that he wouldn’t want to keep doing the same escort work if he moved in with Hank, but that he also wouldn’t want to be idle, that sitting on the couch playing Hank’s video games is all well and good for one day, especially after he’s had a bad night, but that he would resent that long term. It’s the way he’s built. He isn’t a housekeeper, or a domestic assistant. He has to do more than just stay home, has to always be working, and even if he didn’t, he wouldn’t want Hank taking care of him like that...and not even because he doesn’t want to owe him, but because Connor spent the beginning of his life reliant on humans at CyberLife.

And would relying on Hank feel that different just because Hank loves him? Hank doesn’t know. But he’s afraid - and he thinks Connor is, too - that it wouldn’t be.

“Yeah,” he says, kissing Connor’s forehead. “We can talk about it later.”

They stay in bed for a few more hours, Hank tracing patterns on Connor’s skin, and then Hank drives them back to his house. He showers and changes for work, and he leaves Connor sitting on the couch in a DPD sweatshirt with Sumo’s head in his lap. 

Connor smiles when Hank comes around behind him and kisses his forehead, but there’s a weight on his shoulders. Hank wishes more than anything that he knew how to take it from him.

“Listen,” Hank says, stopping in the doorway on his way out and looking back at Connor. “We can talk about this later, but I’ve been thinking about asking you to move in for a while. I like you being here. I just...want you to know that, I guess. If that changes anything. I understand if it doesn’t.”

Connor tilts his head and gives him a small smile. “Okay,” he says softly.

Hank nods and turns back to the door “Have a good day, sweetheart.”

“Love you,” Connor calls after him, and fuck it all, Hank wants to make things okay, somehow. He wishes he knew how to make this hurt less, but there’s only so much he can do to change the world they live in, and nothing at all to change what Connor’s been through.

Still, he wants to.

By the time Hank gets to work, he has a text from Connor asking if he can take Sumo for a walk, which is sweet and a little bit sad since it probably means Connor is already bored of sitting around on the couch by himself.

Hank sets that fear aside, though. He figures they can talk about it when he gets home, along with all the rest of it.

“Yeah,” he writes back instead. “Just keep it short for his hip - he’ll lie to you and tell you he can go farther than he can.”

“Okay,” Connor says. There’s a moment’s pause, and then another text comes through. “Miss you.”

“Miss you, too,” Hank writes back, and it’s stupid, maybe, considering that he just left, but he does mean it. It would never work with the fraternization rules even if Connor wanted it, but there’s some selfish part of him that wants to talk to Jeff anyway, see if he could get Connor a job, because he wishes he could have Connor as a partner. He thinks it would be good for him, that Connor would make him better and he could hold Connor back when he needs it, and he would get to see Connor’s eyes narrow in the way he thinks is so adorable and so terrifying all at once every time he closed in on a lead or put a case together in a way that made sense.

He knows Connor doesn’t want to be a cop, though, even if he does love the work. Hank can understand not wanting to deal with the people.

“I’ll give you a massage tonight if you leave early,” Connor texts him as Hank is walking inside.

Hank snorts at that. “Happy ending included?”

Connor sends a winking emoji back, and Hank almost turns around and gets back in the car without ever stepping inside.

He forces himself to continue into the precinct, though. Jeff comes out to talk to him when he sits at his desk, and for once, he doesn’t chew Hank out, just asks how Connor is doing. They talk a little bit about the repairs, and the asshole technician at CyberLife, since Hank has been holding that in - he hasn’t thought it would do any good to tell Connor what a dick he was, even if he is still pissed about it.

“We should get drinks sometime,” Jeff says when he turns back towards his office. “It’s been a while.”

“I’m actually...you know. I’m trying not to do that anymore,” Hank says, sitting back in his chair.

“No shit?”

Hank shakes his head. “Yeah. No shit.”

Jeff gives him an approving nod, looking more genuinely pleased with him than he has in years. “Good for you. Dinner, maybe?”

“I’d like that,” Hank says. “Just not tonight. I need to get home.”

Jeff claps him on the shoulder with a small smile. “I think that android’s good for you.”

“Yeah,” Hank replies. “I think so, too.”

It’s a boring day, at least as Hank’s workdays go, until much later that afternoon, when one of the receptionists calls back to his desk and says, “Do you have time to take a report?”

“Not really,” Hank says. “Can you throw it to Chris?”

“I can. It’s just there’s android involvement.”

Hank pinches the bridge of his nose. Most android cases still fall to him, a relic of the way they did things in November, although Chris takes some when the sheer volume overwhelms Hank. He isn’t sure he has the stomach to listen to an android talk about what was done to them today, not after Connor, but he still says, “Okay. You can walk them back. What’s the name?”

“Leo Manfred.”

Hank sits up, furrowing his brow. “I thought he was an android?”

“Sorry. He’s reporting an android assaulting him.”

“Okay,” Hank says, mouth dry. “Bring him back.”

It’s not the first time Hank has run into Leo Manfred - they interviewed him back in November, too, after his father died. He tried to say Carl Manfred’s caretaker android attacked him and his father, even if Carl’s cause of death was later ruled as a heart attack. There was no sign that Markus ever touched him, and plenty of evidence that Leo had it out for the android, that he was jealous, that he resented Markus...the sort of jealousy and resentment that might fester since the revolution, until he was a rich kid with a well-known name assaulting an android on the sidewalk for having the nerve to be dressed too nicely.

When the receptionist walks him back and Hank sees his face, he knows. Connor did say he hit him hard.

“Hey, Detective,” Leo says when the receptionist introduces Hank. “We met before.”

“It’s Lieutenant,” Hank says, even if he never pulls rank. “And yeah. I remember.” He gets up, motioning for Leo to follow him to one of the interrogation rooms. “Looks like someone did a number on you,” he says as they walk down the hall.

To his credit, Hank doesn’t betray that he’s pissed.

“Yeah,” Leo says. “Android tried to rob me.” His face is swollen and bruised - Connor didn’t pull his punches.

But Hank won’t, either.

He locks the door behind them when they get to the interrogation room. He doesn’t turn the recording equipment on.

Here’s the truth Hank knows - the system won’t protect Connor, because the system is still so fucking broken...but the system also allows cops to get away with shit every single day.

Hank tries to be a good one. He does.

But this time, he’s operating within that broken system, and he’s getting away with it.

He stays behind Leo while he sits down at the table, and he says, “Do you know what model number the android was? That helps, obviously.”

He needs to be sure.

“Yeah,” Leo says. “It was that famous one, from back in November? RK something, I think...”

He isn’t done talking, but he also doesn’t get anything else out, because that’s the moment Hank takes hold of him and throws his face into the table.

Connor couldn’t have done this. He couldn’t have hurt Leo too badly or defended himself too violently, even if he can take care of himself. The law says he and Leo are equal, but the system still says they aren’t. Put Leo’s word against Connor’s, and Leo would win every time.

Hank’s word, though...Hank knows all too well that he can do whatever the fuck he wants. If there can’t be any real justice, he can at least get this close. 

Leo is holding his broken face, sobbing, when Hank sits down across from him. He didn’t throw him forward as hard as he could have, or as hard as he wanted to, but the kid’s nose is freshly bleeding anyway.

“What the fuck, man?” Leo asks, and Hank tilts his head and pulls out his phone. He flips through to a picture of Connor, and then he holds it up.

“Is this him?” he asks, and he enjoys it too much, the way Leo’s face pales. “You stupid fucking prick.”

Leo tries to start speaking once and then again while Hank puts his phone away, but nothing more than a choked noise comes out each time his mouth gapes wordlessly.

“Here’s what’s going to happen,” Hank says, leaning back in his chair. “I have your ass on the line twice now for filing a false report.”

“I didn’t...”

“You did. Once back in November, when you looked Officer Miller in the eye and said your father’s android hit him. We didn’t do anything about it then, because we were a little busy, but we still have the reports. And now here you are again, with some sob story about an android hurting you. And I’ll tell you, kid, I was up all night - at CyberLife, actually, preventing critical shutdown in the android you stabbed on the sidewalk - so I really don’t have the patience for you coming in here wasting my fucking time.”

A sensible man would try to go. But maybe Leo genuinely thinks he’s in the right, because he gestures at his broken nose and says, “Look at my fucking face!”

Hank tilts his head. “Charges for filing a false report are a year in prison and substantial fines, when we choose to pursue it. Two counts will probably get you a felony, though, and that’s...well. It’s longer. I’ll say that.”

“I didn’t even file anything yet,” Leo snaps.

“No,” Hank says, sliding the tablet across the table to him. “But you’re going to. I won’t do anything with it if you stay out of trouble, but from here on out, I own you. And I swear to fuck, if I ever hear that you’ve touched anyone again, android or human, I will destroy you.” Hank nods at the tablet. “Write your statement.”

Leo cries about it. Minutes stretch on, and ugly sobs rack his shoulders, and tears fall over his battered face.

But he does write the statement.

“Sign it,” Hank says when he finishes, relishing the way Leo’s hand shakes when he does. “Good. Now give me the money you took off of Connor last night.”

“I...”

Hank stands up, and he might not move around the table to get closer to him yet, but the threat is there all the same. “Give it to me,” he says again, and the tone of voice has Leo suddenly digging through his pockets.

He passes Hank a wallet he recognizes as Connor’s - it’s wild, Hank thinks all at once, the arrogance on him, coming in to file a report with Connor’s wallet in his pocket, but Hank is glad he can get it back, even if the money isn’t all there.

“I’m going to go to my lawyer,” Leo says - blubbers, really - as he passes the wallet over.

“Sure,” Hank says, shrugging. “You do that. There’s video evidence of the entire altercation in Connor’s memory. He had your face so fucked up you’ll never prove I touched you here without footage. And good fucking luck putting your word against a police lieutenant who just accepted a medal of valor last month. But even if you  _ could _ do all that, your statement matches exactly what you told the receptionist out front, so what the fuck do you really think your daddy’s lawyer is going to do? You can’t touch me.”

“Fuck you, man.”

Hank smiles. “You know he could have killed you, don’t you? If he wanted to.”

“Whatever. Can I go?”

“Yeah,” Hank says, gesturing towards the door. “I’m sick of looking at you anyway.”

Leo hurries from the room, and Hank doesn’t walk him out. He stays behind, sagging back against the table, breathing in through his nose until his blood is running less hot.

When he gets back to his desk, he looks at the stack of files he has collected there on android victims, most of them who will never see any sort of justice or closure at all.

He feels better, and he doesn’t. 

(Mostly he doesn’t. Because Connor is just one victim in a sea of them, and doing this for him, getting him some kind of justice, however twisted, doesn’t fix the problem. It doesn’t put anti-discrimination laws in place to protect androids from landlords who overcharge for shitholes and job recruiters who will overlook their applications every time. It doesn’t give him the time and the manpower to close every file in front of him, and it won’t bring back the androids who were less lucky than Connor and who didn’t make it to CyberLife on time.)

Hank fixed this. He has Leo pinned down, has everything he needs to ruin him, and he has Connor’s wallet on the desk in front of him. He fixed this one, this time.

But what about the rest of them who are alone? They deserve someone, too.

Hank does end up leaving work a little early, and maybe Jeff is feeling sentimental, because he barely gives him any shit about it at all.

“Be home soon,” he texts Connor when he gets in the car.

When his phone dings, Connor’s text just says, “Good <3”

* * *

Connor does beat all of Hank’s high scores in the arcade game bundle he has on his console.

Not to be a little shit. Mostly just because he doesn’t like being without a goal, and even when he’s at his own apartment, he always needs to keep himself busy with something. Like a compulsion.

(And, okay. He does it to be a little shit a little bit, too.)

He takes a break at some point, takes Sumo for another short walk, does Hank’s laundry, does his dishes, vacuums his floors. He’s trying to be helpful, but he’s also trying to decide if he could like this, waiting at home for Hank while he’s at work if they moved in together, if he feels productive enough to satisfy his programming directives so they won’t gnaw away at him constantly.

He wants to like it. He really does. He likes the thought of falling asleep with Hank every night, likes that he won’t have to struggle with his stasis processes nearly as much since Hank is something of a drug to him. 

He likes that they would spend every day together. He likes that so much.

He even likes the thought of quitting his work, even if he’s proud that he’s built himself into some sort of self-sufficiency, despite the climate. He’s tired of pandering to human men, of being what they want him to be, making himself provocative enough and desirable enough but ultimately blank enough that they feel good and he feels like nothing.

But he doesn’t want to be reliant on Hank. He can’t be. Not after CyberLife, no matter how different the two situations are.

And Connor thinks Hank knows that.

But he knows Hank is going to come home, and they’re going to talk about this, and he knows he could tell Hank he can’t right now and nothing would change, that Hank would let it go and keep on picking him up three times a week for their dates while Connor kept living in his apartment and doing the work he doesn’t care for.

But still. It feels like it’s time for a change, maybe. Maybe a near-death experience will do that to androids just the same as it does to humans, another way they aren’t so different.

Connor decides all at once as he makes dinner that evening that he’s going to move in, if Hank still wants him to when he gets home, that the good things outweigh the ones that scare him. He’ll never like housework - it isn’t what he was built for - but he can occupy himself with it until he’s able to find a real job and pay his portion of the bills. 

He can make taking care of Hank his work. He wants to.

When Hank gets home, Connor has himself seated on the couch again, legs tucked under himself, controller in hand, playing Tetris.

“Hi,” he says without looking up when Hank steps inside. “I beat all your high scores. You’re bad at this game.”

Hank laughs at that. “It’s easier on a computer. It’s not meant to be played that way.”

“Excuses, excuses,” Connor teases him. Hank comes around the couch and kisses his forehead, and Connor smiles as he presses up into the contact. “I made you dinner.”

“Oh,” Hank says, looking into the kitchen where Connor has the soup simmering. “You didn’t have to.”

“I know,” Connor says. “But I can be domestic, when I want to be. I don’t hate cooking.”

Hank is quiet for a moment, and then he gently takes the controller from Connor’s hands and turns the console off. He nudges Sumo aside and sits down next to him on the couch.

“Can we talk?” he asks, and Connor gives him a small smile.

“You don’t want to try my cooking first before you ask me?”

“Nah,” Hank says. “And it’s not about you moving in. Just...here.”

He presses something into Connor’s hands, and when Connor looks down, he realizes it’s his wallet. He opens it, LED spinning red, trying to understand while he flips through the cards and bills inside and Hank watches him.

“What did you do?” he asks softly, and Hank sighs and takes his hand. “I didn’t give you a name.”

“I know,” Hank sighs. “Dumb luck, sweetheart.”

Connor stares at the wallet in his hands, and at Hank’s hand on his thigh, and suddenly he gets it. “He came to the station,” he says, “didn’t he?”

Maybe Connor should have seen that possibility sooner. Because the thing about men like Leo, about the men at CyberLife who built him and tested him, rich men unaffected by the economic insecurity that plagues most of the states, made arrogant and removed by it, is that they believe they’re above it all, that they’re certainly above people like Connor. He should have known Leo would see what happened on the sidewalk last night in such a skewed way that he believed he had a crime to be reported.

“Yeah,” Hank says. “How did you know?”

Connor shrugs. “I always should have known he might.” He looks up at Hank and meets his eyes, holding up his wallet. “He didn’t come to the station to give this to you, though.”

“No,” Hank says. “He wanted to file a report that he had been assaulted. I told him I knew you, and that you had video footage of the encounter that would disprove it. And then I made him write the report anyway, so I can charge him if he does shit like this again.” Hank shakes his head. “He’s an entitled little prick, but I don’t think he has the balls to try anything else, you know? He threatened to get his lawyer, but he doesn’t have a case. I think that’s probably the end of it.”

“Smart,” Connor says softly, tracing his thumb around the edge of his wallet. “Did you hit him?”

A small smile plays over Hank’s face. “I would never.”

“You did.”

“Yeah. Just a little bit. You already had him so fucked up, I figured, who would know?”

“I wish we could interface,” Connor says. “I would have liked to see that.”

Hank looks him over, an eyebrow raised. “You’re not pissed?”

“No. He came to you, right?”

“Yeah. But I thought you might still...I don’t know. Not like it.”

Connor shrugs. “I mean. I guess we’re even now.”

“How are we...”

Connor scrubs a hand over his face. It’s something he’s never figured out how to tell Hank, but he supposes now is the time. “That night, at your award ceremony, when I told you I was going to get our coats. I, um. Cornered Perkins in the bathroom before I went to the coat room.”

“Wait, what?”

“He was giving you shit,” Connor says, and maybe it isn’t enough of an explanation for Hank, but it is for him.

Still, a grin spreads over Hank’s face. “Let me see.” Connor blinks at him, and Hank says, “Oh, come on. I know you have it in your memory banks. Let me see it.”

So Connor pulls up his palm display and shows him. He’s not proud of it, exactly - Perkins looks at him like the weapon he was built to be, and Connor doesn’t like that. It’s a side of himself he doesn’t show often, another ugly thing about him, and one he hadn’t shown Hank yet.

He worries, irrationally, just for a moment, that Hank will look at him the same way Perkins does after he sees it.

He doesn’t, though. When the footage on Connor’s palm display ends, he laughs, and pulls Connor in to him, kisses his hair and says, “You adorable little terminator,” with all the fondness in the world.

That’s the best thing about Hank, really, out of so many good things, that he just takes Connor as he is. It makes Connor see himself differently, too, and it feels important, staying close to him, for that reason and all the others.

“Hey,” Connor says against Hank’s chest where Hank is holding him. “I want to quit my work, and I want to move in with you. Is that okay?”

Hank is quiet for a moment, and then he softly says, “You sure?”

“Yeah. I want to. And besides, you could use someone to help you around here and look pretty doing it. I can be your trophy boyfriend.”

“Aw,” Hank says, squeezing the nape of Connor’s neck. “I actually had another idea, though. Hold on - I need to go get something out of my car to show you.”

Connor pulls back and stares at him, and Hank kisses the furrow in his brow before he goes.

Connor runs his fingers through Sumo’s fur while he waits, an outlet for the idle energy coursing through him. He doesn’t carry the coin he used to use to calibrate his processes anymore, mostly because he needed something stronger and traded it in for the cigarettes, and because CyberLife gave it to him and he didn’t want anything of theirs, but he still finds that the little idle movements help, sometimes. 

When Hank returns, he’s carrying a box of case files with him that he sets on the coffee table in front of Connor. Connor peers into it and realizes he’s seen some of them before, when Hank had some of them home with him. They’re android cases, most of them gone cold.

Connor looks at Hank, who’s watching him fondly, like something big is happening that Connor is missing. “I...don’t get it,” Connor says.

Hank nods at the box. “I can’t help them,” he says. “For some of them it’s because I don’t have the manpower, and for others, it’s because they don’t trust me enough to talk to me and give me what I need to move the case forward. But...you could, I think. If you want to spend your days here cleaning or playing my video games or whatever, then god, baby, I’m not going to stop you. But I think maybe you should do this instead.”

Connor blinks, looking between Hank and the box of files, LED spinning yellow. “Hank,” he finally says, “I tried this before, and it didn’t work. They can’t pay, and I would need a car, and cash reserves, and some sort of office space to work out of...I can’t get those things if they can’t pay. It doesn’t work.”

“I know,” Hank says. “I spent a lot of the afternoon thinking about that, and I can put your name on my bank account. I’d like to buy you a car, too. And I was thinking...” He shrugs, rubbing the back of his neck the way he does when he’s unsure of himself. “I don’t know. I mean, I’ve been holding on to this house for so long because Cole was here, and I haven’t known how to let that go, but being here is...it’s almost like punishing myself, or forcing myself to keep living in the past, and I’m trying to move on from some of that shit. So...I don’t know. I thought we could look for a new place, maybe. Somewhere with a second bedroom that you could maybe convert into an office space. If you wanted to.”

Connor’s LED is still cycling on yellow - Hank’s words are all making sense, but he’s still struggling to understand this. “Hank,” he finally says, “you just spent fifteen thousand dollars at CyberLife, on me. I know you have savings, but you’re plowing through them, and I don’t want you to keep giving everything you have to me when I can’t pay it back or contribute to our bills.”

“I mean,” Hank says, shrugging and grinning a little. “Yeah, that would probably be the end of my spending until we can build our savings up a bit, but I have enough for this, at least. And I want to, sweetheart. I really want to. I can pass you leads from our cases, and you can pass anything you find back to me...it’ll be like we’re partners, even if we aren’t.”

It’s too much, and there’s an ache behind Connor’s thirium pump that makes him feel like he needs to go into stasis to avoid it, since that’s been his coping mechanism for so long.

But some pains are good, and some demand to be felt, so he looks at Hank and says, “Who says we wouldn’t be partners?”

Hank smiles and pulls Connor into his arms. Connor shifts into his lap, smiling and laughing and kissing him.

“Okay,” Connor says softly when they part, leaning his forehead against Hank’s. “Okay.”

“Okay,” Hank replies, smiling. “But you really need to adjust to cheaper tastes after this, baby. I’m not made of money.”

Connor knocks a fist into his chest in mock annoyance, but he can’t mask his smile at all. He wonders if he’s ever been so happy. He doesn’t think he has.

It’s a long time before they part - Connor only reluctantly slips from Hank’s lap when he hears Hank’s stomach growling. While Hank is in the kitchen getting dinner, Connor checks through the contents of his wallet, realizing that there’s a single cigarette tucked inside.

He holds it up when Hank returns with his food and a beer. “Look,” he says. “I think this is my last one.”

“Huh,” Hank says, lifting the beer in his hand. “My last one in the fridge, too.”

They look at each other for a moment, not saying anything and understanding all the same. 

It’s good, Connor thinks, closing a chapter with a gesture. He likes a good metaphor.

He tucks his cigarette between his lips and fishes his lighter from his pocket. “Do you mind if I do?” he asks. “Just this once?”

Hank shakes his head and opens his beer while Connor lights the cigarette and inhales a breath of it.

And it still feels good. It does. He just thinks maybe he needs it less these days, when other things feel better.

He reaches for Hank’s hand and laces their fingers together. They watch a game, and go to bed early since Hank didn’t sleep the previous night. Connor makes good on his promise to give him a massage, and a few other promises he didn’t make, too.

When Hank falls asleep, Connor lies at his back and holds him. He doesn’t go into stasis tonight, but he doesn’t need to, and for once, he doesn’t want to run from his thoughts.

He spends the night thinking about what could be. He’s spent other nights like that, too, wondering if his life is the best he’ll ever do for himself, if things will ever get better, anxious little thought processes that he can’t escape.

Tonight, he listens to Hank breathing, and he thinks of that word again, ‘partner’, over and over, and what could be is nothing terrible at all.

* * *

It's a symbolic gesture in the end, Connor's cigarette and Hank's beer, and not much more. Connor does buy another pack, and Hank does get another case, because of course healing doesn't work like that.

Healing comes slow, and it comes in waves. Sometimes Connor needs the crutch he learned to rely on in the months since the revolution, and he knows Hank does, too. Deciding to be better is good, but it doesn't take the pain away.

But they are trying to be better. They rely on their vices less and less, and on each other more.

Connor will have his last cigarette someday, and odds are he won't even realize it's his last when he does, that it won't feel special at all until he looks back on it, the way so many things do.

He feels like that's coming for him, and for Hank, too. He's almost sure of it.

It's been a few weeks now since they made the decision to move in and move forward together, since Connor canceled his standing appointments with his clients and removed his profile online. Connor has spent most of those days at Hank's house, although he does have a few new clients occupying his time now too, in a line of work that he finds far more fulfilling.

On the last day of April, the first warm day of the season - the first true spring Connor will have ever seen - he and Hank pack up the last of what remains in his apartment.

Most of the furniture is already gone - they donated what Connor didn't like, gave the bed and his bookshelf away to androids he knew who needed it, and kept a few of the smaller pieces he was attached to. There's not exactly room for much else in Hank's house, but they'll be moving to a new one soon, if all goes well, and Connor likes that Hank's home feels full, that they've made room for both of them.

Connor loads a few things into his car - a blue hatchback that they found used for a decent price, that Connor likes and that he knows Hank thinks is cute - while Hank buys him out of the rest of his lease. It’s hopefully the last money Hank will spend on him in a while.

When Hank joins him upstairs, the place is almost empty, and Connor is standing there, feeling small in the middle of it.

"Hey," Hank says when he steps inside. "You ready to go? That first open house is at two, and Kristen doesn't like it when we're late."

(Kristen is their realtor. It took them a while to find one who didn’t react to Connor any differently than Hank, but she didn’t, and Connor still doesn't believe he has a realtor.)

"Yeah," Connor says, pointing to the box by the door. "You want to get that for me?"

It's blatantly labeled "toys", because Connor doesn't have any shame, and because he still likes it, needling his way under Hank's skin, the same way he liked it that first day they met.

Hank raises an eyebrow when he picks it up. "Really?" he asks, unimpressed, and Connor shrugs innocently.

"Last one," he says cheerfully.

“You know,” Hank says, “I think you’re getting  _ less  _ subtle, somehow.”

Connor grins. “I’m pretty dick dumb these days.”

Hank laughs - Connor loves his laugh, so much, and he loves that he hears more of it these days - and peeks inside the box, curious. "What's the little disk thing do?"

"Oh." Connor leans back against the counter, smiling. "It's an inhibitor."

"Like...what? A weird android cock ring?" Hank says, deadpan, and Connor shrugs again.

"Don't be crass, Hank," he says, although the disapproval in his tone is entirely manufactured, and he suspects Hank knows it.

Hank takes it from the box and pockets it. "Mine now," he says. "I was just thinking it's been a few days since I made a mess of you."

Connor loves that bit of confidence that he sees from Hank more and more these days, and he can't hide his smile even as he tries to somberly say, "It has been, yes. I’ve been so busy making a mess of you.”

Hank laughs and kisses him. "Come on. We're going to be late."

Connor gives the apartment one last glance before he follows Hank out. He still doesn't dislike it, even if he knows it's small and overpriced and awful in so many ways. It was his, and the first thing he had. He doesn't think he'll ever look back on it and hate it, even if there's something waiting ahead of him now that he wants more.

He still thinks about the future all the time, the way he always has, but now he thinks about the two bedroom house he and Hank are on their way to see, with the bay windows he likes in the room they would make his office. He thinks about Hank saying casually a few nights ago that when Connor's investigative firm is financially viable, he thinks he might like to quit the force and come work with him instead.

He thinks about the ring Hank thinks he has hidden from him in his dresser, and how he'll still act surprised when Hank gives it to him.

Connor shuts the door behind himself when he leaves, and then he catches up to Hank on the stairwell, slipping his hand into Hank’s back pocket and smiling when Hank wraps his free arm around his shoulders.

"Love you," Connor says, and Hank smiles and runs a hand through Connor's hair. He says it too much, maybe, but he also doesn't think Hank minds.

They pack the last of the boxes into the car, and Connor looks back on it, at so much of his life packed neatly into the cab, and at his first home behind him, when he puts his car in gear.

"You going to miss it?" Hank asks him.

Connor doesn't look back as he leaves it behind. 

"A bit, maybe," he says. "But this is better."

And as he pulls away from the curb, like he always does, like he did that first night and probably always will, he reaches across the console for Hank's hand.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

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